ANNALS 



FAMINE IN IRELAND, 



IN 1847, 1343, AND 1849 



J 

BY MES. A. NICHOLSON, 

author of " Ireland's welcome to the stranger. 




NEW YORK: 

E. FRENCH, 135 NASSAU STREET. 

1851. 



"DMSO 



INTRODUCTION 

TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. 



Mrs. Asenath Nicholson, the author of the fol 
lowing pages, is a native of Vermont, where she is 
extensively known, (by her maiden name of Hatch,) 
as an able teacher. She is also widely known as for 
many years the keeper of a boarding house in this city, 
(on the Vegetarian principle,) which used to be the 
resort of hundreds of choice spirits from all parts of 
the country, including most of the names of those who 
were engaged in measures of social reform. She is a 
woman of great acuteness of intellect, and of the most 
self-sacrificing benevolence, with great independence of 
mind and force of character. 

Her visits to Ireland and labors there are but the 



iV INTRODUCTION. 

workings of her character ; and those who are best 
acquainted with her wonder neither at her courage nor 
at her adventurous and untiring charity. 

Her first work on Ireland — " The Stranger's Wel- 
come," narrates her travels and observations prior to 
the Great Famine of 1847. It was republished in 
this city some years ago. The present work recites 
some of the scenes which she witnessed during that 
calamitous season. Her heart was in a continual 
agony, and her limbs wearied by incessant toils to re- 
lieve if it could be only a small part of the misery she 
witnessed. In answer to appeals on her behalf, some 
funds were placed at her disposal from this country, by 
friends who knew how effectively they would be em- 
ployed in her hands. The tale of woe should be read 
by the whole American people ; it will have a salu- 
tary effect upon their minds, to appreciate more fully 
the depth of oppression and wretchedness from which 
the Irish poor escape in coming to this land of plenty. 

For the sake of giving a wider circulation to the 
material facts of the Famine and its effects, the Ameri- 
can publisher has thought it advisable to omit some 
chapters which were contained in the English edition, 



INTRODUCTION. v 

giving a history of Ireland from the conquest by Henry 
II. of England ; as this information can be obtained in 
other works. 

J. L. 

New York, April, 1851. 



PREFACE. 



The reader of these pages should be told that, if 
strange things are recorded, it was because strange 
things were seen ; and if strange things were seen 
which no other writer has written, it was because no 
other writer has visited the same places, under the 
same circumstances. No other writer ever explored 
mountain and glen for four years, with the same ob- 
ject in view ; and though I have seen but the suburbs 
of what might be seen, were the same ground to be 
retraced, with the four years' experience for an hand- 
maid, yet what is already recorded may appear alto- 
gether incongruous, if not impossible. And now, 
while looking at them calmly at a distance, they ap- 
pear, even to myself, more like a dream than reality, 
because they appear out of common course, and out 
of the order of even nature itself. But they are 
realities, and many of them fearful ones — realities 
which none but eye-witnesses can understand, and 
none but those who passed through them can feel. 



Vlll PREFACE. 

No pretensions to infallibility either in judgment or 
description are made — the work is imperfect because 
the writer is so — and no doubt there are facts recorded 
which might better have been left out. In such a con- 
fused mass of material, of such variety and such 
quality, I am not so vain as to suppose that the best 
has always been selected or recorded in the best way. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

Object of the work — General Remarks on the Condition of 
Ireland before the Famine — Coachman's reasons for 
Murder — Difficulties of writing a correct work on Ire- 
land — Position of the writer, &c, . . . .13 

CHAPTER II. 

Cup of Trembling — Irish Housekeeping — Indian Meal — 
First News of the Famine — Kind Judge — First Starv- 
ing Person, and Means of Preserving him — Unexpect- 
ed Assistance from New York — Joseph Bewley — Soup- 
shop — Manner of carrying Bread through the Street — 
Cook-street Labors in Dublin — Central Relief Commit- 
tee in Dublin — Amount of Moneys — God's Promises 
and Dealings, 25 

CHAPTER III. 

Stewards — Meal from New York — Sacks, and Government 
Arrangements for Distribution of Meal — Donation 
from Pauper Children of New York — Convent — Going 
to Belfast — Doings of the Women there — Hirelings 
and Voluntaries — Hon. William Butler — William 
Bennett — Mrs. Hewitson — Visits to George Hill — 
Patrick M'Kye's Letter, 58 



X CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IV. 

PAGE 

George Hill's Movements and Success — Facts of Gweedore 
— Visit to Dungloe and Arranmore — Mr. Griffith — 
Sports of Children gone — Roshine Lodge — Return to 
Belfast by Derry — Visit to Antrim — A Cave — Return 
to Dublin — Journey to Connaught — Mistake in Cha- 
racter of a Starving Man — Misery at Newport — 
Orphan Boy— Abraham and Sara — Sara's Bed and 
Burial. — Abraham's Death and Burial — Drinking Hab- 
its — Moderate Drinking Clergy, . . . .93 

CHAPTER V. 

The Sound — Tour to Belmullet — Landlords — Tenantry — 
Walk on the Sea-coast — Burying-ground — Ship- 
wrecked Sailors' Burial — Manner of Burying the 
Starving — Soldiers of Belmullet — Appearance of the 
People — Passport — Mr. Cony — Samuel Bourne — The 
Girl of the Mountain — Miss Wilson — Return to Bel- 
mullet — Scene of the Cattle Drivers, and Courage of a 
Boy — Letter to a London Friend — Return to the Sound 
— Dreadful Storm — Drowning of Fishermen — Reading 
with Servants — Achill — Bad Management of Grants — 
Disposition of Children, 134 

CHAPTER VI. 
Poorhouses, Turnips, and Black Bread, .... 166 

CHAPTER VII. 

Newport — Pulling down Houses — Mr. Pounding — Gildea — 
Burial at Newport — Molly Maguires, &c. — Rebellion 
of 1848— Croy Lodge and Ballina— The Self-denying 
Child — Hunting, and Habits of a Hunting Lady — Visit 
to Ballina — Hospitality of Peter Kelly — Character of 
Mr. Kincaid — Captain Short, and the people in gene- 



CONTENTS. XI 

PAGE 

ral Leaving the Town — Stop at Ponton and Arrival at 
Castlebar — Trial for Murder — The Feelings of the 
Jury — Patrick's Day — Widow Fitzgerald — Visit to 
Partra — Balinrobe — Sense in the Mountains — Old Pa- 
rish Priest — Visit to Balinrobe — To Cong — Industry of 
the Curate — Visit to Balinrobe Workhouse — Old Head 
— Distress there — Louisburgh — Excursion to the Xillery 
Mountains, &c. — Excursion to Adelphia — Incidents — 
Good Landlady — Shepherds — Romantic Scenery — Re- 
turn — Rockery — Adieu — West Port and Castlebar — 
Soup-shops — Soyer's Soup — Journey to Tuam — Chil- 
dren in the Convent — Happy Results — Sad Treatment 
on a Car — Arrival at Cork — Description of Cove and 
Cork — Scenery up the Lee — Deaths in the Famine — 
Blarney — Castlemartyr — Potato Blase — Spike Island — 
Mathew Tower — Letters, 179 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Grave of Charles Wolfe — Water Cure — Friends' Funeral, 2G4 

CHAPTER IX. 

Leaving Cork — Passage to Dublin — New Trials there — Re- 
flections on Past Labors, &c. — Last Look of Ireland — 
Summing up — Landlords — Clergymen — Relief Officers 
— Going out of Ireland, ...... 320 



THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 



CHAPTER I. 

" Stript, wounded, beaten, nigh to death, 
I saw him by the highway-side." / 

Those who have read the volume called Ireland's 
Welcome, have been informed that I left New York in 
the spring of 1844, for the purpose of exploring and 
ascertaining, by eye-witness, the real condition of a 
people whose history has been mixed with fable, and 
whose true character has been as little understood as 
their sufferings have been mitigated. 

In pursuing this work, the object is not precisely the 
same as in the preceding one ; that was but the surface 
— the rippling of that mighty sea, whose waves have 
since been casting up little else but " mire and dirt," 
and whose deep and continual upheavings plainly in- 
dicate that the foundations, if not destroyed, are fast 
breaking up. I then aimed at nothing more than 
giving a simple narration of facts, as they passed under 
observation, leaving the reader to comment upon those 



14 ANNALS OF THE 

facts, as their different features were presented to the 
mind. 

Some, and possibly many, have been grieved that so 
much "plainness of speech" has been used; but here 
emphatically " flattering titles " should have no place ; 
opiates have served no other purpose for diseased 
Ireland than to leave undisturbed the canker-worm 
that was doing more effectually his deadly work within. 
" Peace, peace," where there is no peace, eventually 
brings down the chastenings of the Almighty, and He 
has shown in language that cannot be misunderstood, 
for the last three years, that He sitteth in the heavens, 
overturning and overturning the nations of the earth, 
and, in his own due time, He whose right it is to rule 
will rule. The stone is rolling, and its velocity in- 
creases as it proceeds. The potato has done its work, 
and it has done it effectually : it has fed the unpaid 
millions for more than two centuries, till the scanty 
wages of the defrauded poor man have entered into the 
" cars of the Lord of Sabaoth," and He is now telling 
the rich that " their gold and silver is cankered," and 
that their day is coming speedily. 

We are gravely told that the year 1844 was one of 
great abundance, and that the peasantry were then a 
contented and happy people ; but listen ! the year 1844 
was a year of abundance, but did the poor man share 
in this abundance — was he contented and happy? 
Why then was the whole country rocking "to and fro" 
with the cry of repeal'? and, Why was 0' Council in 
prison? Were the people all singing in their chains, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 15 

not feeling the galling of the fetters, till he aroused 
them from their " contented " sleep 1 Did his fiery 
breath fan up embers that had lost all power of life ? 
and were there no heartburnings beneath the tatters of 
the degraded cabiner, that strongly prompted to make 
a struggle for that liberty, which God has by birthright 
bestowed upon all bearing his image 1 A struggle they 
would have made, had one nod from the prison grates 
of O'Connell given the signal. Though there was no 
clamor, yet the leaven was silently leavening the whole 
lump, and they appeared anxiously waiting for some 
event, which they felt must come, they knew not 
whence, nor cared not how. 

But the year of abundance. From June 1844 to 
August 1845, I visited the middle and southern part, 
including all the sea-coast, always on foot in the most 
destitute regions, that I might better ascertain the con- 
dition and character of the peasants in their most 
uncultivated state. What I then saw of privation and 
suffering has been but partially sketched, because the 
"many things" I had to say the world was not then 
able to bear, neither are they now able to bear them 
all ; but posterity will bear them, and posterity shall 
hear them. Please read the partial sketch of Bantry, 
Glengariffe, and the sea-coast of Kerry, given the years 
1844-5, and enter into some floorless, dark, mud cabin, 
and sit down upon a stool, if haply a stool be there, 
and witness the " abundance " of those happy fertile 
days. Again and again did I partake of a scanty meal 
of the potato, after a day's walk of miles, because 



16 ANNALS OF THE 

I knew a full repast would deprive the family of a part 
of the supply in reserve for the meal, which by multi- 
tudes was then taken but once a day. 

Mark ! these are not isolated cases, but everywhere 
in the mountainous regions, upon the sea-coast, and in 
the glens ; from Dublin to the extreme south did I 
daily meet these facts. Nor was this privation of 
short continuance : from Christmas to harvest the poor 
peasant must stint his stomach to one meal a day, or 
his seed for the coming crop would be curtailed, and 
the necessary rent-payer, the pig, not be an equivalent 
to keep the mud cabin over the head of his master. 

So much for "abundance;" now for "content." 
That there was an unparalleled content, where any- 
thing approached to tolerable endurance, cannot be 
denied, but this was their religious training ; however 
imperfect their faith and practice may be, in patience 
they have, and do exemplify a pattern which amounts 
almost to superhuman. " We must be content with 
what the Almighty puts upon us," was their ready 
answer when their sufferings were mentioned ; yet this 
did not .shut their eyes to a sense of the sufferings 
which they felt were put upon them by man, and their 
submission seemed in most cases to proceed from the 
requirements of the Almighty, rather than from igno- 
rance of their wrongs ; for in most instances the parting 
question would be, " Don't ye think the government is 
too hard on us ; or do ye think we shall ever git the 
repale, and will Ireland ever be any better," &c. That 
they are a happy people so long as any ray of hope 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 17 

remains, or when they share in common the gifts of 
Providence, must be allowed ; yet their quick perception 
of justice often manifests itself, where any loop-hole 
is made which promises amendment to their condition, 
and when the nickering spark of life is kindled within 
them. They have committed bold and wicked acts, 
which revenge prompted by a sense of injustice alone 
would do. Justice long withheld, and oppression mul- 
tiplied proportioned to uncomplaining endurance, some- 
times awakes to a boldness almost unequaled by any 
but the savage of the wilderness ; nor do they wait for 
the night, or seek any other concealment, than to make 
sure of their prey — they care not who sees them, or on 
what gallows they are hung, if the hated victim be out 
of the way. 

" Hark ! from yon stately ranks what laughter rings, 
Mingling wild mirth with war's stern minstrelsy. 
His jest — while each brave comrade round him flings, 
And moves to death with military glee. 
Boast, Erin ! boast them tameless, frank and free, 
In friendship warm, and cool in danger known, 
Rough Nature's children, humorous as she. 
And he, great chieftain, strike the proudest tone 
Of thy bold harp, green Isle, the hero is thine own." 

Seldom do they murder for money, and in no country 
where oppression has ruled have the oppressed plun- 
dered and robbed so little as in Ireland, yet they can 
plunder and rob ; and these crimes are multiplying and 
will multiply till a new state of things places them in a 
different condition. 

I was riding upon a coach in the second year of the 



18 ANNALS OF THE 

famine, in a lonely part of the -west, when the coach- 
man pointed me to a corner around the wall, and re- 
marked, u When I passed this place to-day, a man lay 
dead there who had been killed sgme hours before by 
one of the tenants living upon the land here." " Why 
did he do the shocking deed V 9 I inquired. " A good 
deed, by dad," was the answer. " Why lady, he was 
the greatest blackguard that ever walked the airth ; he 
was agent to a gentleman, and he showed no mercy to a 
poor man that was toilin' for the potato ; but as soon 
as the famine was sore on the craturs, he drove every 
one into the blake staurm that could not give the rent, 
and many's the poor bein' that died with the starvation, 
without the shelter ; and wouldn't ye think that such 
a hard-hearted villain better be dead, than to live and 
kill so many poor women and helpless children, as 
would be wanderin' in the black mountains this winter, 
if he should live to drive 'em there." Now, this is 
certainly unchristian logic, but it is resentful nature's 
logic, and in accordance with all the principles of 
national killing. In vain I preached and held up a 
better principle — " A great good had been done to all 
the parish, and all the parish should be glad that so 
many lives had been saved by this one which had been 
taken." 

It was night, and I felt a little relief when a police- 
man ascended the coach, who was going in quest of a 
coroner ; a sad .deed, he added, but the murdered man 
was hard-hearted, and no doubt that it was some of the 
tenants on the land of which lie was agent who did the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 19 

work, yet not one has escaped. " And why," retorted 
the driver, " should a hap'orth of 'em take up the heel ; 
they have done a good deed, and if they're hung, it will 
be better than the starvation." The policeman was 
silent, and I was not anxious to pursue the fruitless 
argument with one who saw no light, but through the 
medium of doing unto others as others do to him. And 
where this principle prevails, as it does in the hearts of 
all the unsanctified, the wonder is that so few have 
been the lawless deeds that have been transacted in 
that oppressed country for centuries gone by. The 
mischief is all laid at the door of the Papists ; and when 
I speak of the Christianity of Ireland, I would do it 
with caution — I would not " hurt the oil or the wine," 
— I would not " judge nor set at naught my brother," 
— but I would say deliberately and conscientiously, that 
if those who call themselves the only true light of that 
benighted land, the only safe lamps to guide to the 
heavenly country, were more careful to show mercy and 
walk humbly, they might long ago have seen a better 
state of things. Yes, had Bible men and Bible women 
possessed that love in heart which has been upon the 
tongue, had they manifested that tenderness for Christ, 
as they have for a party, a name, or a church ; had 
they been as assiduous to win souls to Christ by love 
and kindness, as they have to gather in their tithes by 
law and violence, many who are now scoffing at a 
" truth held in unrighteousness," might have been 
glorying in one producing holiness and peace. But I 
forbear : " murder will out," wrong will be righted, 



20 ANNALS OF THE 

however painful the process, and though judgment long 
delay, yet it must come at last ; the wheel of Provi- 
dence is ever rolling, and every spoke belonging to it 
must in turn be uppermost, and the oppressed cannot 
always be at the bottom. . 

The object of this volume is to place before the 
world a plain and simple outline of what is called the 
Famine of Ireland, in 1846-7-8-9. 

But before I take the reader down the sides of this 
dreadful gulf, before I uncover to him the bowels of 
that loathsome pit, on the margin of which he often 
may have tremblingly stood, I will gird up his mind for 
the conflict, by taking him, in the autumn of 1845, and 
the spring of 1846, through the more fertile and happy 
north, where we are told that better management has 
produced better results ; there we shall find mementos 
of deep interest, when, ages now passed away, this 
people stood out to surrounding nations not as a " by- 
word and hissing,' 1 but as a noble example of religion, 
industry, and prosperity, which few if any could then 
present. And though its early history is quite ob- 
scured by fiction, and interlarded with poetical romance, 
yet all this serves to prove that the remains of a true 
coin are there, or a counterfeit would not have been 
attempted. 

Not only in the north, but scattered over the whole 
island, are found inscriptions on stone, some standing 
above ground and others buried beneath, which, by 
their dates and hieroglyphics, tell you that centuries 
ago men lived here, whose memories were honored, not 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 21 

only for their valor in war, but for their purity of life. 
It was not till I had faithfully explored the interior 
and southern coast, that the early history of this people 
had been much studied ; as my object then, was to see 
them as they are found in the nineteenth century, with- 
out investigating particularly their age or pedigree. 
In my later excursions facts so startled and convinced 
me that their pretensions to former prosperity and 
greatness were not fabulous, that I regretted for my 
supineness on the subject ; for I found by well authen- 
ticated history, that the common saying among the peas- 
antry that Ireland was once " a land of saints," was 
founded in more truth than her enemies or even friends 
are ready to acknowledge ; and the belief is quite con- 
firmed in my mind, that when searching for truth con- 
cerning a nation " scattered and peeled," as the Irish 
have been, the true ore can better be found in the un- 
polished rubbish, in the traditions of a rude nation, 
retained from age to age, than among the polished gems 
of polite literature, written to please rather than in- 
struct, and to pull down rather than build up. 

It has never been my lot to meet with a straight- 
forward, impartial, real matter-of-fact work, written on 
that devoted country, till since the famine commenced. 
It has been suggested that an Irishman could not write 
an impartial book on his country, and an Englishman 
or Scotchman would not. 

The last three years have abundantly proved, that 
there are many Englishmen, who can not only feel, but 
act for that poor despised island, who would rejoice 



22 ANNALS OF THE 

to see her rise, yes, who would and do take her by the 
hand, who not only talk, but make sacrifices for her 
welfare ; and let me record it with gratitude, that pos- 
terity may read the efforts they have made and are 
still making, to place this down-trodden people among 
the happiest nations of the earth. Gladly would I 
record, were the privilege allowed me, the names of 
those Quakers, those Dissenters of all denominations, 
and many of the Churchmen too, who have done much 
in the days of darkness, for the starving poor of that 
land ; yes, let me record as a debt of gratitude I owe 
to England, the scenes I have witnessed, when some 
box of warm clothing was opened, when the naked, 
starving women and children would drop upon their 
knees, and clasp their emaciated fingers, and with eyes 
raised to heaven, bless the Almighty God for the gift 
that the kind English or blessed Quaker had sent 
them ; and while I was compelled to turn away from 
the touching view, my heart responded Amen and 
Amen. Let this suffice, that when in these future 
pages truths may be recorded that will not always be so 
salutary, yet be assured these truths are such as 
should be told, and they will not meet any cases men- 
tioned in the above — in other language, they will not 
fit where they do not belong. 

My position in regard to the condition and feeling 
of Ireland during the famine, was different from all 
others ; I must necessarily look at things with different 
eyes, and different sensations from what others could 
do ; I was a foreigner, could not expect, and did not 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 23 

ask, any reward either in praise or money for the in- 
terest I might take in that country ; I was attached to 
England, as the race from which I descended, and 
pitied Ireland for her sufferings, rather than I admired 
her for any virtues which she might possess ; conse 
quently, my mind was so balanced between the two, 
that on which side the scale might have preponderated, 
the danger of blind partiality would not have been so 
great. 

Besides, the country had previously been traversed, 
the habits and propensities of the cabiners been studied, 
they had been taken by surprise when no opportunity 
was given for escape or deception. I was always an 
unexpected guest, and gave them no time to brush up 
their cabins, or put on their shoes, if happily they 
might have any. When the famine came over them, 
they were placed in a different position to draw out 
their feelings toward others, and the pangs of hunger 
induced them necessarily to act unreservedly ; all party 
feeling was lost, and whoever gave them bread was the 
object to which they most closely hung, and to those 
who rudely sent them empty away, the answer was often 
made, " May the blessed God never give ye to feel the 
hunger." 

And here it must be written that, though some might 
be ungrateful, yet such were the exceptions ; as a 
people they are grateful, and patient to a proverb. 
Not" a murmuring word against God or man did I once 
hear among all the dying, in those dreadful days, and 
the children were taught by parents and teachers to 



24 THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 

fall on their knees morning and evening, to pray 
Almighty God to "bless their kind benefactors and 
keep them from the hunger," and many have died 
with these prayers on their lips. I must not enlarge ; 
these things are not mentioned to probe afresh the 
painful sensations which philanthropists have felt for 
Ireland, but to bear a testimony to facts, which deserve 
to be recorded ; and should any of these facts appear 
exaggerated, let it be said that no language is adequate 
to give the true, the real picture ; one look of the eye 
into the daily scenes there witnessed, would overpower 
what any pen, however graphic, or tongue, however 
eloquent, could portray. 

As my eye was single to one object, as I have ever 
peculiarly felt that I was acting for eternity, in acting 
for Ireland, the candor I use must be forgiven, and 
the pronoun I can make no other apology but sheer 
necessity, as no we had a part in anything essential 
which will be recorded in these pages. 

When the hand that pens these pages, and the heart 
that has been lacerated at these sufferings, shall have 
ceased together, may Ireland and her benefactors " live 
before God." 






CHAPTER II. 



" Afar we stand, a gloomy band, 
Our worth, our wants neglected, 
The children in their fatherland 
Cut off, despised, rejected." 



Allow me to say to the reader, that the cup I now 
hold in my hand is a " cup of trembling," and gladly 
would my sickening heart turn away from its contents, 
"but 'for this cause was I sent,' and the cup which 
my Father has given me shall I not drink it ?" Yes, 
for this cause was I sent, for this cause, in the face of 
all that was thought consistency or prudence, unpro- 
tected by mortal arm or encouraged by mortal support, 
was I bidden to go out, and to go " nothing doubting" 
into a strange land, and there do what I should be 
bidden, not knowing what that might be nor inquiring 
wherefore the work were laid upon me. 

I came, the island was traversed, stormy days and 
dark nights, filthy cabins and uncomfortable lodging- 
houses were my lot, evil surmises from the proud pro- 
fessor, and the cold neglect of many, were all alike to 
me ; the " tower" into which I ran was always safe 
and always open, the " rock" under which I sheltered 
was indeed " higher than I," and the tempest passed 
harmlessly by. 



26 ANNALS OF THE 

From June 1844 to December 1846, though I could 
say with the disciples returning from Emmaus, that 
" my heart burned within me," yet with them I must 
add, my "eyes were holden," that I had not yet seen 
the ultimate object, nor had the slightest curiosity been 
awakened as to the result of the researches which had 
been made, who would understand or misunderstand, 
who would approve or condemn. Ireland's pride and 
Ireland's humility, her wealth and her poverty, her 
beauty and deformity, had all been tested in a degree, 
and the causes of her poverty stood out in such bold 
relief, that no special revelation, either human or 
divine, was requisite to give a solution. 

" Will not God be avenged on such a nation as this V 9 
was the constant question urging me, and the echo is 
still sounding as the mighty wave is now rolling over 
the proud ones who have " held the poor in derision, 3 ' 
and the only answer is, " What will ye do in the end 
thereof?" What avails the multiplicity of prayers 
while the poor are oppressed 1 The surplice, the gown, 
or the robe will not hide the stain ; the " leprosy lies 
deep within." "For all this his anger is not turned 
away, but his hand is stretched out still." 

Too long have ye " dwelt in your ceiled houses," 
while the poor, who have " reaped clown your fields for 
naught," have been sitting in their floorless, smoky 
cabins, on the scanty patch where they have been al- 
lowed to crouch, till your authority should bid them 
depart, to eat their potato on some bog or ditch else- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 27 

where. And more fearful than all, now that the root 
on which you have fed them for centuries is taken 
away ; famished and naked you drive them into the 
pitiless storm. Ye withhold from them labor, and then 
call them " idle ;" ye give them work without any just 
equivalent, and then cry out when the scanty food is 
blasted, " Improvidence, Improvidence /" — that had 
these " idlers" put by anything for a " rainy day," 
they might have had money to have bought bread ! 
That idleness and improvidence, (which are generally 
companions,) are two great evils of Ireland, must be 
acknowledged. The rich are idle from a silly pride 
and long habits of indulgence ; and the poor, because 
no man " hires them." 

" Would you have us work," said a shopkeeper's 
wife, " when we can get scores of girls, glad to do it, 
for 10s. a quarter?" Here is one of the sources of 
evil : the " ways of the household," which are specially 
allotted to the u prudent wife," are made over to the 
uninterested servant; because this poor servant was 
"glad" to work for a little more than nothing. The 
keys of the house are peculiarly the care of the mis- 
tress, and with these well pocketed she prevents all 
inroads into her larder, and the servant may eat her 
potato at option, for in but few families is she allowed 
bread and butter or tea. This keeping everything 
locked, we are told, is to keep servants from theft — the 
surest method of making them thieves. Their late 
hours of rising and of meals, necessarily unhinge all 
that is good in housekeeping ; and where all is left to 



28 ANNALS OF THE 

servants, economy must come in by-the-by. The middle 
class, such as shopkeepers, good farmers, and trades- 
men of all kinds, live on a few articles of diet, and the 
mistress seldom taxes her ingenuity to apply the useful 
proverb, " To make one thing meet another." Bread, 
butter, tea, and an egg, are the ultimatum of a break- 
fast, at nine, and often ten in the morning ; then a 
yawning about, or perhaps a little fancy knitting, till 
lunch, which is a piece of cold meat and bread, and in 
the higher classes wine ; a dinner from four to six, and 
tea often brought on before leaving the table, or in an 
hour after. The dinner is, among farmers and trades- 
men, mostly pork, put upon a platter with cabbage, and 
potatoes served in two ways : first, brought on in the 
jackets, as they are boiled; next dish, which is the 
dessert in most houses, the potatoes are browned upon 
a griddle, which gives them a good flavor. Bread is 
seldom or never taken with potatoes, and a pudding is 
rarely seen, except on special occasions. Pies are often 
made ; but these are the chief commodities, and always 
ended by "hot whisky punch." This accompaniment 
is so necessary, that in genteel families a handsome 
copper kettle is kept for the special purpose, which is 
put upon a frame in the center of a table. The " lower 
order" only, are teetotalers, because, as the reason is 
often given, " it was necessary for them, they were so 
ignorant and vulgar." Now what, must it be expected, 
could the daughters of such a family be 1 Why, the 
exact copy of the mother ; the servant must do for her 
what would be for her own health, and what is actually 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 29 

her duty to perform. She is sent to school, and goes 
the routine of a genteel education. She can work 
Berlin wool, perhaps read French, and possibly German, 
play the piano, and write a commonplace letter, in 
angular writing, made on purpose for the ladies ; but 
with all this her mind is not cultivated, her heart is not 
disciplined. She looks pretty, walks genteelly, and talks 
sometimes quite enchanting] y ; but with all these ap- 
purtenances, the inquiry must and docs arise — " What 
are you good for V 9 The little, common, necessary 
daily duties which belong to woman, are unheeded ; and 
when any exigencies fall upon her, she has no alterna- 
tive. A mind always accustomed to the same routine, 
and that a frivolous one, cannot, when unexpected ad- 
versity comes, plunge into new difficult duties and per- 
form them efficiently. If she have always had a dress- 
maker to fit her apparel and a waiting-maid to put it 
on, how can she, should her husband become a bank- 
rupt, be qualified to make and repair the garments for 
herself and children, which probably she must do, or 
her children be in a very untidy state. 

Now, as trifling as these things appear to many, yet 
Ireland has suffered, and is still doomed to suffer deeply, 
on these accounts. Many of these genteel ones are 
reduced to the last extremity, the mistresses not being 
able to give even the 10s. per quarter to a servant. 
She knows not how economically to prepare the scanty 
food which her husband may provide ; and multitudes 
of this class are either in the walls of the union, or 
hovering about its precincts. 



30 ANNALS OF THE 

When the famine had actually come, and all the 
country was aghast, when supplies from all parts were 
poured in, — what was done with these supplies 1 Why, 
the best that these inefficient housekeepers could do. 
The rice and Indian meal, hoth of which are excellent 
articles of food, were cooked in such a manner that, in 
most cases, they were actually unhealthy, and in all 
cases unpalatable. So unused were they to the use of 
that common article, rice, that they steeped it the night 
before, then poured the water off, without rubbing, and 
for three and four hours they boiled, stirred, and sim- 
mered this, till it became a watery jelly, disgusting to 
the eye and unsavory to the taste, for they never salted 
it ; besides unwholesome for the stomachs of those who 
had always used a dry potato for food. The poor com- 
plained that it made them sick ; they were, accused of 
being ungrateful, and sometimes told they should not 
have any more ; and the difficulty, if possible, was in- 
creased, by giving it out uncooked, — for the starving 
ones in the towns had no fuel and they could not keep 
up a fire to stew it for hours, and many of them ate it 
raw, which was certainly better, when they had good 
teeth, than cooked in this unsavory way. 

But the Indian meal ! Who shall attempt a descrip- 
tion of this frightful formidable 1 When it first land- 
ed, the rich, who had no occasion for using it, hailed it 
with joy, and some actually condescended to say, 
" They believed they could cat it themselves." But 
the poor, who had not yet slid down the precipice so 
fur as to feel that they were actually dying, could be 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 31 

heard on the streets, and in the market-place, interro- 
gate one another, " And have ye seen the yaller In- 
dian, God save us awl ? By dad and ' Peel's brim- 
stone' has come over again, to scrape the maw of every 
divil on us." 

The reader must be content to take the famine just 
as I saw it ; and though the language may be some- 
times startling, to refine it by any substitution or sea- 
soning of my own invention would be weakening its 
force, and oftentimes frittering away the truth. In 
justice it should be said that they often use the word 
devil in a quite different meaning from what others do, 
always applying it to a poor neglected creature, how- 
ever deserving he may be, as well as to those who are 
wicked. Thus they would often say, " The breath is 
cowld in the poor divil's body, he'll no more feel the 
hunger, God bless him !" And the yaller Indian was 
called by all manner of epithets, and went through 
all manner of ordeals but the right one. The Indian 
meal by some was stirred in cold water ^vith a stick, 
then put quite dry upon a griddle, it consequently 
crumbled apart, there was no turning it ; and one de- 
sponding woman came to me, saying, " That the last bit 
of turf had died on her, and not a ha'porth of the yal- 
ler Indian would stop with its comrade." Others 
made what they call " stirabout ;" this was done, too, 
by first steeping in cold water, then pouring it into a 
pot, and immediately after swelling, it became so thick 
that it could not be stirred, neither would it cook in 
the least. The "stirabout" then became a "stand- 



32 ANNALS OF THE 

about," and the effect of eating this "was all but favor- 
able to those who had seldom taken farinaceous food. 
They were actually afraid to take it in many cases, the 
government meal in particular, fearing that the " Ing- 
lish intinded to kill them" with the " tarin and scrap- 
in ;" but when hunger had progressed a little, these 
fears subsided, and they cared neither what they ate, 
or who sent it to them. 

Had the women of the higher classes known how to 
prepare these articles in a proper manner, much money 
might have been saved, and many lives rescued, which 
are now lost. 

When the first clamor had a little subsided, there 
followed the recipes for cooking Indian meal. One of 
these, highly celebrated for a while, was from Italy, 
and called " Polentia ;" whether spelt correctly the 
learned must decide ; but this same Polentia would do 
for gentlemen and ladies too. The recipe cannot pre- 
cisely be given ; but enough to know that it was turned 
and overturned — covered and uncovered — boiled and 
steamed in a pot — and then came out genteelly, in a 
becoming shape, according to the form of the pot used. 
Now this was often on the tables of the gentry, for the 
recipe and meal were from Italy ; the poor would only 
hear of this at a distance — the cooking they could never 
attain. Next came American recipes : these, with all 
due credence, were accepted as the one thing needful, 
for they possessed these redeeming qualities : — first, 
they were from America, the land which they loved, 
for many of their " kin" were there ; next, that though 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 33 

they thought that nobody but negroes ate it — yet ne- 
groes lived on that food ; and " sure the Americans 
wouldn't hurt em." 

These recipes were prepared in due form, and made 
up with suets, fats, sweets, and spices, so that the 
Laird John Russell himself could " ate em." A great 
and grand meeting of lords and nobility was held, 
called by the poor, the " yaller Indin maitin ;" and a 
hona fide sanction put on to the Indian meal cake. 
Here again was a difficulty — the meal was for the 
hungry ; Where could they procure spices, sweets, and 
fats for such delicacies ? — and as they thought that 
these were necessary to make it safe to eat, then their 
fears were awakened anew. But a few weeks adjusted 
all these difficulties, for when the number of the slain 
had increased in every parish, all murmuring at the 
quality of the food ceased — they suffered in uncom- 
plaining silence. 

It was on the evening of December 7th, when about 
stepping into the train, at Kingstown, for Dublin, I 
heard a policeman relating to a bystander a case of 
famine at the south. The potato, I knew, was partly 
destroyed ; but never thought that actual famine would 
be the result. The facts were so appalling, that had 
they not come from a policeman, who, it should be said, 
are in general men of veracity, my mind would have 
doubted ; and when he added that " I got this infor- 
mation from a friend who was present in the court, and 
who wrote the circumstances to me," all queries were 
removed. 

2* 



34 ANNALS OF THE 

A man had died from hunger, and his widow had 
gone into the plowed field of her landlord to try to 
pick a few potatoes in the ridges which might be re- 
maining since the harvest ; she found a few — the land- 
lord saw her — sent a magistrate to the cabin, who 
found three children in a state of starvation, and noth- 
ing in the cabin but the pot, which was over the fire. 
He demanded of her to show him the potatoes — she 
hesitated ; he inquired what she had in the pot — she 
was silent ; he looked in, and saw a dog, with the 
handful of potatoes she had gathered from the field. 
The sight of the wretched cabin, and still more, the 
despairing looks of the poor silent mother and the fam- 
ished children, crouched in fear in a dark corner, so 
touched the heart of the magistrate, that he took the 
pot from the fire, bade the woman to follow him, and they 
went to the court-room together. He presented the pot, 
containing the dog and the handful of potatoes, to the as- 
tonished judge. He called the woman — interrogated 
her kindly. She told him they sat in their desolate cabin 
two entire days, without eating, before she killed the 
half -famished dog ; that she did not think she was 
stealing, to glean after the harvest was gathered. The 
judge gave her three pounds from his own purse ; told 
her when she had used that to come again to him. 

This was a compassionate judge, — and would to God 
Ireland could boast of many such. 

I heard that story, heart-rending as it was, and soon 
found that it was but a prelude to facts of daily, yes, 
hourly occurrence, still more appalling. The work of 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 85 

death now commenced ; the volcano, over which I felt 
that Ireland was walking, had burst, though its ap- 
pearance was wholly different from anything I had ever 
conceived ; a famine was always in Ireland, in a cer- 
tain degree ; and so common were beggars, and so 
many were always but just struggling for life, that not 
until thousands w T ere reduced to the like condition of 
the woman last mentioned, did those, who had never 
begged, make their wants known. They picked over 
and picked out their blackened potatoes, and even ate 
the decayed ones, till many were made sick, before the 
real state of the country was known ; and when it fell, 
it fell like an avalanche, sweeping at once the entire 
land. No parish need be anxious for neighboring ones 
— each had enough under his own eye, and at his own 
door, to drain all resources, and keep alive his sympa- 
thy. It was some months before the rich really believ- 
ed that the poor were not making false pretenses ; for 
at such a distance had they ever kept themselves from 
the " lower order," who were all " dirty and lazy," 
that many of them had never realized that four mil- 
lions of people were subsisting entirely on the potato, 
and that another million ate them six days out of seven, 
entirely ; they did not realize that these " lazy ones" 
had worked six or eight months in the year for eight- 
pence and tenpence, but more for sixpence, and even 
threepence in the southern parts, and the other four 
months been " idle" because " no man had hired them ;" 
they did not realize that the disgusting rags with which 
these " lazy" ones disgraced their very gates, and 



36 ANNALS OF THE 

shocked all decency, were the rags which they had 
contributed to provide : and such were often heard to 
say that this judgment was what they might expect, as 
a reward of their " religion and idleness." But the 
wave rolled on ; the slain were multiplied ; the dead 
by the way-side, and the more revolting sights of fam- 
ilies found in the darkest corner of a cabin, in one 
putrid mass, where, in many cases, the cabin was 
tumbled down upon them to give them a burial, was 
somewhat convincing, even to those who had doubted 
much from the beginning. 

There were some peculiarities in this famine which 
history has not recorded in any other. It may be 
scrupled whether any were heard to say that they 
did not deserve it — that they had not been such sin- 
ners above all others, that they must suffer so much — 
and so little plundering was never known in any 
famine as this ; scarcely ever was a bread shop dis- 
turbed, though the poor creatures have been found dead 
under its window, in sight of it ; the old proverb that 
" hunger will break through a stone wall," was never 
exemplified during the famine ; some carts, laden with 
meal, have been pillaged, and some boats have been 
robbed, but these were not common occurrences ; occa- 
sionally, in the cities, would a man throw a stone at a 
street lamp, or do some other trifling mischief, always in 
presence of a policeman, that he might be put in jail, 
where the law must feed him. This was certainly an 
alternative for a starving man not so much to be cen- 
sured as admired. Let it be stated that these men had 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 37 

applied for work in vain. I will descend to particu- 
lars ; and state what my eyes have seen and my ears 
have heard, and be answerable for whatever statements 
are thus made. 

The first starving person that I saw was a few days 
after the story of the woman and dog had been related. 
A servant in the house where I was stopping, at Kings- 
town, said that the milk woman wished me to see a 
man near by, that was in a state of actual starvation ; 
and he was going out to attempt to work on the Queen's 
highway; a little labor was beginning opposite the 
house, and fifteen-pence a-clay stimulated this poor 
man, who had seven to support, his rent to pay, and 
fuel to buy. He had been sick with fever ; the clothes 
of his family that would fetch any price, had been 
pawned or sold, and all were starving together. He 
staggered with his spade to the work; the overseer 
objected ; but he entreated to be allowed to try. The 
servant went out and asked him to step into the kitch- 
en ; and, reader, if you have never seen a starving 
human being, may you never! In my childhood I had 
been frightened with the stories of ghosts, and had 
seen actual skeletons ; but imagination had come short 
of the sight of this man. And here, to those who have 
never watched the progress of protracted hunger, it 
might be proper to say, that persons will live for 
months, and pass through different stages, and life will 
struggle on to maintain her lawful hold, if occasional 
scanty supplies are given, till the walking skeleton 
is reduced to a state of inanity— he sees you not, he 



38 ANNALS OF THE 

heeds you not, neither does he beg. The first stage is 
somewhat clamorous — will not easily be put off; the 
next is patient, passive stupidity ; and the last is 
idiocy. In the second stage they will stand at a win- 
dow for hours, without asking charity, giving a vacant 
stare, and not until peremptorily driven away will they 
move. In the last state, the head bends forward, and 
they walk with long strides, and pass you unheedingly. 
The man before mentioned was emaciated to the last 
degree ; he was tall, his eyes prominent, his skin shriv- 
eled, his manner cringing and childlike ; and the im- 
pression then and there made never has nor never can 
be effaced ; it was the jirst, and the beginning of these 
dreadful days yet in reserve. He had a breakfast, and 
was told to come in at four and get his dinner. The 
family were from home ; the servant had an Irish heart, 
consequently my endeavors were all seconded. Often 
has she taken the loaf allowed for her board-wages, 
(that is, so much allowed weekly for food,) and sliced 
nearly the whole away — denying herself for the suffer- 
ing around her. It must be mentioned that laborers 
for the public, on roads, seldom or never ate more than 
twice a day, at ten and four ; their food was the potato 
and oatmeal stirabout, and buttermilk, the luxury 
which was seldom enjoyed. This man was fed on 
Indian meal, gruel, buttermilk or new milk and bread 
in the morning ; stirabout, buttermilk and bread at 
four. ^ Workmen are not paid at night on the public 
works, they must wait a week ; and if they commence 
labor in a state of hunger, they often die before the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 6\) 

week expires ; many have been carried home to their 
wretched cabins, some dead and others dying, who had 
fallen down with the spade in their hands. The next 
day after this wretched man was fed, another, in like 
condition, at work in the same place, was called in and 
fed ; he afterward died, when the labor was finished, 
and he could get no more work. The first man grad- 
ually gained strength, and all for him was encourag- 
ing ; when my purse became low — so many had been 
fed at the door that a pot was kept continually boiling, 
from seven in the morning till seven at night ; Indian 
meal was then clear ; the Americans had not sent their 
supplies ; and much did my heart shrink at the thought 
that my means must be exhausted. 

Let me here speak of the virtues of Indian meal ; 
though always having been accustomed to it, more or 
less, not till December, 1846, in the famine of Ireland, 
did I know its value. It was made into gruel, boiled 
till it became a jelly ; and once a day from twenty-five 
to thirty were fed — some who walked miles to get it ; 
and every one who had this privilege recovered without 
tasting anything but that, once a day — they always 
took it till they wanted no more ; and this too without 
bread. One old man daily walked three miles, on his 
staff, for this, and he grew cheerful ; always most cour- 
teously thanking me, saying, " It nourishes my ould 
heart, so that it keeps me warm all the night." 

I had told these two laborers that when they found 
the gate locked they must know that I had no more to 
give them, and they must go home. The sad hour 



40 ANNALS OF THE 

arrived ; the overseer sent me word that he thanked 
me for feeding them so long ; they must otherwise have 
died at their work. The gate was shut, and long and 
tedious were the next two days. One child of the poor 
man died, and he buried it in the morning before light, 
because if he took an hour from labor he would be 
dismissed. When the poor creatures that had daily 
been fed with the gruel came, and were told there was 
no more for them, I felt that I had sealed their doom. 
They turned away, blessing me again and again, but 
" we must die of the hunger, God be praised." 

I would not say that I actually murmured, but the 
question did arise, " Why was I brought to see a 
famine, and be the humble instrument of saving some 
few alive, and then see these few die, because I had no 
more to give them ?" 

Two days and nights dragged on. News was con- 
stantly arriving of the fearful state of the people, and 
the specters that had been before my eyes constantly 
haunted me. My bedroom overlooked the burying- 
ground. I could fancy, as I often arose to look into it, 
that some haggard father was bringing a dead child, 
lashed to his back, and laying him on some tombstone, 
as had been done, and leaving it to the mercy of who- 
ever might find it a grave ! 

I was sitting in solitude, alone, at eleven o'clock, 
when the man of the house unexpectedly arrived. He 
had a parcel ; in that parcel there was money from 
New York, and that money was for me ! 

No being, either Christian or pagan, if he never saw 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 41 

a famine, nor possesses a feeling heart, can understand 
what I then felt. I adored that watchful Hand that 
had so strangely led and upheld me in Ireland ; and 
now, above all and over all, when my heart was sinking 
in the deepest despondency, when no way of escape 
appeared, this heavenly boon was sent ! The night 
was spent in adoration and praise, longing for the day, 
when I might again hang over the " blessed pot," as 
the Irish called it. I lay below on a sofa, and saw no 
tombstones that night. 

The morning came — the pot was over the fire. As 
soon as shops were opened, meal, bread, and milk were 
purchased. The man of the house went early to his 
business in Dublin. The gate was unlocked — the 
breakfast was prepared. The quantity was well-nigh 
doubled, though enough had always been provided be- 
fore. The sight of the man was more than I wished 
to abide ; he was again sinking — had taken nothing but 
a " sup," as he termed it, of some meager slop but 
once in the day, because his children would all die if 
he took it from them. The other soon followed ; and 
while they were taking their breakfast, I was reading 
from New York the result of a meeting there in behalf 
of the Irish. This awakened gratitude toward my 
country unknown before ; and now, should I not be 
unmindful of the Hand that had led me through this 
wilderness thus far, and in every emergency carried me 
almost miraculously through, if what I am about to 
record of the few following months, so far as self is 
concerned, should be withheld? 



42 ANNALS OF THE 

That day my mind was most active, devising Low the 
greatest good might be effected by the little which God 
had intrusted to me. Indian meal, when cooked in a 
suitable manner, was now becoming a great favorite ; 
this I knew how to do, and determined to use the money 
for this object, always cooking it myself. When this 
was adjusted in my mind, the remainder of the day was 
devoted to writing letters to America, mostly for the 
two objects of thanking them for what they had done, 
and giving them, from eye-witness, a little account of 
the famine. In this, the desire and even the thought 
was entirely withheld of receiving anything myself to 
give ; acting entirely as a passive instrument ; moving, 
because moved upon. Here, afterward, was the wis- 
dom of Him who sees not as man seeth, peculiarly ma- 
nifest ; for had I that day, by the parcel put into my 
hands from New York, been in possession of a hundred 
pounds, the day would have been spent in going into 
the cabins of the starving, and distributing to the needy 
— the money would have soon been expended, and then 
no more means would have been in my power to do 
good. But my weakness was God's strength, my pov- 
erty His riches ; and as He had shown me, all the 
journey through, that my dependence should be entirely 
on Him, . so now, more than ever, it was to be made 
manifest. The letters crossed the ocean, found the 
way to the hands and hearts of those to whom they were 
sent, and, when in the multitude of other thoughts and 
cares they were by the writer forgotten as a past dream, 
they were returned, embodied in a printed parcel, ac- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 43 

companied with donations of meal, money, and clothing ; 
and this, like the other, reached me when all means 
were exhausted. 

When the rumor of a famine had become authenti- 
cated in Dublin, Joseph Bewley, a Friend, possessing 
both a warm heart and full purse, (which do not always 
go together,) put in operation a soup shop, which fed 
many hundreds twice a day. This soup was of the best 
quality, the best meat, peas, oatmeal, &c. ; and when 
applications became so numerous that a greater supply 
was requisite and funds failing, mention was made to 
this benevolent man that the quantity of meat must be 
reduced, his answer was, that not one iota should be 
taken off, but more added, if even it must be done en- 
tirely at his own expense. It shall, he added, be made 
rich and nourishing, as well as palatable. The poor 
who could, were required to pay half-price for a ticket ; 
and benevolent people purchased tickets by the quantity, 
and gave to the poor. The regulation of this soup 
establishment was a pattern worthy of imitation. The 
neatness and order of the shop ; the comely attired 
Quaker matrons and their daughters, with their white 
sleeves drawn over their tidy-clad arms — their white 
aprons and caps, all moving in that quiet harmony so 
peculiar to that people ; and there, too, at seven in the 
morning, and again at midday. All this beauty and 
finish, contrasted with the woe-begone, emaciated, filthy, 
ragged beings that stood in their turn before them, was 
a sight at which angels, if they could weep, might weep, 
and might rejoice too. Often have I stood, in painful 



44 ANNALS OF THE 

admiration, to sec the two extremes of degradation and 
elevation, comfort and misery, cleanliness and filth, in 
these two classes, made alike in God's image, but 
thrown into different circumstances, developing two 
such wide and strange opposites. 

My task was a different one — operating individually. 
I took my own time and way — as woman is wont to do 
when at her own option ; and before the supplies, which 
afterward came through the letters mentioned, I marked 
out a path which was pursued during that winter, until 
July, when I left for the North. A basket of good di- 
mensions was provided, sufficient to contain three loaves 
of the largest made bread ; this was cut in slices, and 
at eight o'clock I set off. The poor had watched the 
" American lady,' 3 and were always on the spot, ready 
for an attack, when I went out ; and the most efficient 
method of stopping their importunities was bread. No 
sooner well upon the street, than the army commenced 
rallying ; and no one, perhaps, that winter, was so regu- 
larly guarded as was this basket and its owner. A 
slice was given to each, till it was all exhausted ; while 
in desperation, at times, lest I might be overpowered — 
not by violence, but by number — I hurried on, some- 
times actually running to my place of destination, the 
hungry ones, men, women, and children, who had not 
received the slice, in pursuit — till I rushed into some 
shop-door or house, for protection, till the troop should 
retire ; sometimes the stay would be long and tedious, 
and ofttimes they must be driven back by force. Cook 
street, a place devoted almost entirely to making coffins, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 45 

and well known by the name of Coffin street, was the 
field of my winter's labor. This was chosen for its ex- 
treme poverty, being the seat of misery refined ; and 
here no lady of "delicate foot" would like to venture; 
and beside, I saw that a little thrown over a wide sur- 
face was throwing all away, and no benefit that was 
lasting would ensue. Ten pounds divided among a 
hundred, would not keep one from starvation many 
days ; but applied to twenty, economically, might save 
those twenty till more efficient means might be taken. 
So much a day was allowed to each family, according 
to their number, — always cooking it myself, in their 
cabins, till they could and did do it prudently them- 
selves. The turf was provided and the rent paid 
weekly, which must be done, or, in many cases, turning 
upon the street was the consequence : for it is no more 
than justice to observe, that there are some kind slave- 
holders in the United States, and there are some kind 
landlords in Ireland ; but in too many cases both are 
synonymous terms, so far as power may be equal. 

One of these miserable families was that of a widow. 
I found her creeping upon the street, one cold night, 
when snow was upon the ground. Her pitiful posture, 
bent over, leaning upon two sticks, with a little boy and 
girl behind her crying with the cold, induced me to in- 
quire, and I found that she was actually lame, her legs 
much swollen, and her story proved to be a true one. 
She had been turned from the hospital as a hopeless 
case, and a poor, sick, starving friend had taken her in, 
and she had crawled out with a few boxes of matches to 



46 ANNALS OF THE 

see if she could sell them, for she told me she could not 
j T et bring herself to beg ; she could work, and was 
willing to, could she get knitting or sewing. I inquired 
her number. " I will not deny it again/' she replied ; 
" I did so to a lady, soon after I came out of the hos- 
pital, for I was ashamed to be found in such a dreadful 
place, by a lady ; but I have been so punished for that 
lie, that I will not do it again." Giving her a few 
pence, and meaning to take her by surprise if I found 
her at all, an indirect promise was made to call at some 
future day. At ten the next morning my way was 
made into that fearful street, and still more fearful 
alley which led to the cheerless abode I entered. 

The reader may be informed that in the wealthy, 
beautiful city of Dublin, which can boast some of the 
finest architecture on earth, there are in retired streets 
and dark alleys, some of the most forbidding, most un- 
comfortable abodes that can be found in the wildest bogs 
of that wretched country. Finding my way through 
darkness and filth, a sight opened upon me, which, 
speaking moderately, was startling. When I had re- 
covered a little, I saw on my right hand the miserable 
woman before-named, sitting in a dark corner on a little 
damp straw, which poorly defended her from the wet 
and muddy ground-floor she was occupying. The two 
ragged, hungry children were at her feet ; on the other 
side of the empty grate (for there was not a spark of 
fire) sat the kind woman who had taken her in, on the 
same foundation of straw and mud, with her back 
against the wall. She was without a dress — she had 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 47 

pawned her last to pay her rent ; her husband likewise 
had pawned his coat for the same purpose. He was 
lying upon the straw, with a fragment of a cotton shawl 
about him, for he had no shirt. They were all silent, 
and for a while I was mute. The woman first men- 
tioned broke the pause, by saying, " This, I believe, is 
the kind lady I met last night : you have found the way 
to our dark place, and I am sorry Ave cannot ask you to 
sit down." There was not even a stool in the room. 
The young woman had been sick for weeks, and was 
now onty able to sit up a little ; but having neither 
food, fuel, or covering, nothing but death stared them 
in the face ; and the most affecting part of the whole to 
me was the simple statement of the widow, who said, in 
the most resigned manner, " We have been talking, 
Mary and I, this morning, and counting off our days ; 
we could not expect any relief, for I could not go out 
again, and she could not, and the farthest that the good 
God will give us on earth cannot be more than fourteen 
da}^s. The children, may be," she added, " God would 
let her take with her, for they must soon starve if left." 
This had been a cool calculation made from the ap- 
pearance of the present condition, and without the least 
murmuring they were bringing their minds to their cir- 
cumstances. " You are willing to live longer," I said. 
" If the good God wills it," was the answer ; " but we 
cannot see how." They did live. Daily did I go and 
cook their food, or see it cooked, and daily did they im- 
prove ; and in a few weeks many an apronful of shav- 
ings and blocks were brought to me from the coffin- 



48 ANNALS OF THE 

shops, by the young woman who was sitting almost 
naked on the straw. They both were good expert knit- 
ters and good seamstresses ; and my garments, which 
were approaching to a sisterhood with many of the 
going-down genteel ones, were soon put in tidy repair 
by this young woman. Often, late in the evening, would 
I hear a soft footstep on the stairs, followed by a gentle 
tap, and the unassuming Mary would enter with her 
bountiful supply of fire- kindling ; and when she was told 
that less would do very well, and she should keep more 
for herself, she replied, " I can do with little, and you 
would not like to go to the shop for any." She watched 
my wardrobe, kept everything in the best repair, and 
studied my comfort first, before she seemed to know 
that she needed any. I had saved her life, she said, 
and that was more than all she could do for me ; and 
the day that I sailed from Dublin for England, as I 
was hurrying along the street, some one caught me by 
my dress, and turning about, Mary stood before me, 
whom I had not seen for months, having been absent in 
the mountains. She had a basket on her arm, was 
comfortably clad, said she was selling fruit and vege- 
tables and doing well ; the other was still with her, in 
ill health, but not suffering for food. " Farewell, Mary, 
we shall meet no more on earth ; may God fit us both 
for a better world ! " " Shall I never see you again 1 — 
God be praised that he sent you to us ! " 

The man whom I found on the highway at Kingstown, 
having heard that I was going from Ireland, walked 
seven Irish miles that day, to see and thank me, and 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 49 

leave his blessing. I was out, and regretted much, for 
his sake as well as mine, that he was disappointed. 
These testimonials were more grateful to me than would 
have been a donation of plate from the government. 
They were God's testimonials — the offerings of the 
poor ; and that heart is not to be envied that does not 
know their blessing. 

Another feeble dying woman I found upon the street, 
one rainy day, who had reached a state of half-idiocy, 
and for two years was fed and partly clothed, whether 
I was in Dublin or not ; and though she had a tolerable 
supply of food, her mind never rallied ; yet she always 
knew and acknowledged, even to a weakness, her bene- 
factress. She never has yet been made in the least to 
rely on herself ; what she is bidden to do is done like a 
child, and then she is satisfied. 

These few cases are given as specimens, not wish- 
ing to be tedious with such narrations, only to show 
the character of the famine, and its effects in general 
on the sufferers, with whom I was conversant. The 
distribution of the bread in the street was continued, 
not even Sabbaths excepted ; my basket was often 
taken near the chapel door, and left in some house till 
I came out. So pressing at last was the crowd, that J 
dare not go into a shop to take out my purse to buy the 
most trifling article, and a bread-shop above all was 
avoided. There was no fear of violence, but the dread- 
ful importuning, falling upon their knees, clasping their 
emaciated hands, and their glaring eyes fixed upon me, 
were quite too much. Sometimes I endeavored to steal 



50 ANNALS OF THE 

into a shop in the evening unperceived, but never suc- 
ceeded. Hunger, in its incipient stages, never sleeps, 
never neglects its watch, but continues sharpening the 
inventive faculties, till, like the drunkard's thirst, in- 
trigue and dissimulation give startling proof of the 
varied materials which compose the entire man. From 
the first look that was presented me by the starving 
man in Kingstown, a common desire for food never re- 
turned, so that through the winter, but little was neces- 
sary for my wants. Twopence halfpenny worth of 
cocoa for a week, threepence halfpenny for milk, three- 
pence for sugar, and fourteenpence for bread ; making 
in all twenty-threepence, was the most ever used ; but 
in a few weeks, necessity compelled a reducing the ex- 
pense, from which not the least inconvenience was felt. 
My practice was to pay the mistress for lodgings 
weekly, in advance, that she might feel no uneasiness ; 
and after doing this one Monday morning, my purse 
promptly told me that Saturday night would leave my 
poor pensioners, one m particular, without a shelter, if 
the usual quantity of food were taken. Something 
must be clone : money was exhausted, and from no 
human source could I that week look for more. In a 
paper I had a pound of Indian meal — the cocoa, milk 
and sugar were stopped, and the meal made into gruel, 
twenty-three pence was reduced to fourteen ; and when 
the meal was expended, a penny roll was taken into 
my muff as the day's excursion commenced, and eaten 
when and where opportunity best presented, and in- 
clination most strongly prompted. The widow's rent 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 51 

was paid, no inconvenience felt, and before the next 
demand was made, an unexpected call for a few books 
which I had published in Scotland, put me in posses- 
sion of a little more, so that the " cruise of oil" never 
failed. The pensioners were fed in the mean time 
from their own industry, for the women had been pro- 
vided with knitting, which though poorly paid, yet kept 
them from actual hunger. Another expedient I never 
omitted when available. The people of Dublin, among 
the comfortable classes, whatever hospitality they might 
manifest toward guests and visitors, had never troubled 
themselves by looking into the real home wants of the 
suffering poor. Enough they thought that societies of 
all kinds abounded, and a poor-house besides, were 
claims upon their purses to a full equivalent for all 
their consciences required, and to visit them was quite 
unlady-like, if not dangerous. To many of these I had 
access as a matter of curiosity, to hear from me the 
tales of starvation, which they were now to have dealt 
out unsparingly ; and so kind were the most of them 
that the interview generally ended by an invitation to 
eat, which was never refused when needed, and the 
meal thus saved was always given to the hungry. 
These people would not have given a shilling in money, 
but many and many a meal of gruel was provided from 
these hap-hazard lunches, through that sad winter ; 
and, more than this, a kind woman who is now in her 
grave, and with whom I had once lodged, gave me an 
invitation, which was to continue during my labors in 
Dublin, of coming to dine with her every Sabbath ; and 



52 ANNALS OF THE 

then a bountiful, well-cooked dinner of vegetables and 
a pudding were always provided. These kind Sabbath 
dinners were all I tasted that winter ; two meals a day 
for the other six, made me quite satisfied. Something- 
better was now in reserve. 

The Central Committee of the Society of Friends, 
which was organized in November, 1846, had effectu- 
ally and untiringly begun, and carried on one of the 
most extensive and noble plans that probably had ever 
been known under any circumstances of distress, by 
private individuals. And their first circular should be 
stereotyped and kept, that future generations may 
read. One or two sentences only are here recorded, as 
specimens of the spirit which moved this faithful body 
of men : — 

" Many of us partake largely of the Lord's outward 
gifts ; and it is surely incumbent on us to be prompt in 
manifesting our sense of His unmerited bounty, by offices 
of Christian kindness to our suffering fellow-creatures. 
May we prove ourselves faithful stewards of the sub- 
stance intrusted to us. 

" Let none presume to think that the summons to 
deep and serious thoughtfulness, and to a close search- 
ing of heart, does not extend to him. Which of us has 
ever experienced what it is to want food 1 May none 
of our hearts be lifted up by these things, or betrayed 
into forge tfulness of our dependent condition, and of 
our utter unworthiness of the least of the Lord's mer- 
cies ; for surely to each of us belongs the bumbling in- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 58 

quiry, ' Who maketh thee to differ from another, and 
what hast thou that thou didst not receive V " 

Other committees soon cooperated with this ; Water- 
ford, Limerick, Cork, Youghal, &c, were moved to like 
exertions. Nor did these exertions rest on the British 
side of the Atlantic. 

In March, 1847, an extract from the Central Relief 
Committee, says ; In consequence of a letter addressed 
by Jacob Harvey of New York, to Thomas P. Cope, a 
meeting was held in Mulberry Street House, commit- 
tees appointed to make collections, &c, and what was 
the result 1 The report says, " Considering the short 
time which had elapsed at the period of our latest ac- 
counts, since sufficient information of the distress of 
Ireland had reached the American public ; that from 
the great extent of the mission no opportunity had then 
been afforded for the full development of public feeling ; 
that the supplies of money and food already received 
and on the way, are but the first-fruits of their liber- 
ality ; the movement must be regarded as one of the 
most remarkable manifestations of national sympathy 
on record." And in another report, after two years 
and a half labor, this same Committee say that, refer- 
ring to their circular, " it was responded to, not merely 
by those to whom it was addressed ; but by many un- 
connected with our religious societies in these countries, 
and also by the citizens of the United States, to an ex- 
tent and with a munificence unparalleled in the history 
of benevolent exertions. The contributions confided 
to us, in money, food, and clothing, amounted to 



54 ANNALS OF THE 

about ^£200,000, of which more than half was sent 
from America." The Committee add, that " the con- 
tributions intrusted to them were but a small propor- 
tion of the whole expenditure for the relief of the 
country." 

America sent much money, and many ship-loads of 
provisions, which did not pass through the hands of this 
committee. The British Relief Association dispensed 
about £400,000. The distribution by other relief as- 
sociations may be estimated at fully <£200,000 ; and the 
collections by local committees in Ireland exceeded 
.£300,000. The aggregate of the whole, taking remit- 
tances from emigrants, private benevolence, &c, was 
not less than one million and a half sterling. Govern- 
ment relief, ten millions sterling. 

To return to individual exertion. The New York 
people opened a fund ; appointed a Treasurer ; and 
devoted the avails to me, to be used at my discretion ; 
and sent these donations, at first, through the chan- 
nel of the Central Committee, in Dublin. This favor 
to me was more than can be described or imagined by 
any who never witnessed what I had, and who had 
never been placed in the same condition to act. I now 
ascended an eminence which was a lofty one ; and on 
which I hope I may never again stand — such a mission, 
however honorable it may be to be able to rescue our 
fellow-creatures from death, has an unnatural cause for 
its claim ; and when famine is allowed to progress till 
the slain are multiplied, it says one of two things : — 
First, that the promise of a " seed-time and harvest" 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 55 

did not embrace a sufficiency of food for every mouth 
in the world ; or else that man has not done his duty in 
securing that food. Now God never deals vaguely 
with man, his promises are clear and definite, his de- 
mands rational and peremptory : — " Do this and live ; 
neglect it, and die." When He said " seed-time and 
harvest," He said, by that, food shall always be suf- 
ficient for man : and never was a famine on earth, in 
any part, when there was not an abundance in some 
part, to make up all the deficiency ; and if man is not 
warned by some dreamer, like Pharaoh, of a seven 
years' famine, to secure a wise Joseph, to provide in 
advance for a seven years' destitution ; yet if he is a 
wise husbandman, a good steward, a discerncr of the 
signs of the times — when the skies drop down " extra 
fatness," and the harvests are doubly laden with rich 
fruit, he hesitates not in believing that tithes and offer- 
ings will be called for somewhere, into the storehouse 
of the Lord, proportionable to the seventh day's manna 
that was rained from the heavens, to be gathered on 
the sixth. 

Thus Ireland's famine was a marked one, so far as 
man was concerned ; and God is slandered, when it is 
called an unavoidable dispensation of His wise provi- 
dence, to which we should all humbly bow, as a chas- 
tisement which could not be avoided. As well might 
we say to the staggering inebriate, that he must be 
patient under a wise dispensation of Providence — that 
the Lord does not willingly afflict him, &c, as to say 
that the starving thousands in Ireland must submit 



56 ANNALS OF THE 

patiently, because God, for wise purposes, had turned 
from all natural laws to send this affliction upon them ; 
for in the first place, the potato had been, everywhere 
in Ireland, an indirect curse, and in many parts a 
direct one ; for centuries the poor had been oppressed 
and degraded by this root — for oppression is always 
degradation; they had not the privilege even of the 
beasts of the desert in variety ; for the brutes, where 
instinct or pleasure demand, can select their food ; the 
bird, if it cannot find a corn, may select a seed ; the 
lion, if he cannot find an opportunity to capture any 
nobler game, may secure a sheep or calf ; the cat, if 
the mouse be not in reach of her stealthy step, may se- 
cure the unwary bird, or if the wing of the bird be too 
lofty she may put her quick paw and fasten the nails 
into the darting fish ; the horse or cow, if grass from 
the meadow or hay from the stack be wanting, may 
be supplied from the full granary ; but the Irish must 
masticate the potato every day in the year, either boiled 
or roasted, with or without salt; and if his churlish, 
dainty, grumbling palate should show any symptoms of 
relishing food like other men, he is told that, lazy, 
dirty, and savage as he is, the potato is a boon which is 
quite too good for him. Now when God gave the 
"herb bearing seed, and the tree bearing fruit," to 
man, He said not that one portion of mankind shall be 
confined to a single root ; and though his patience long 
continued to see him fed on this root, by his masters, 
yet, in his own time, He " came out of his place," and 
with one breath blackened and blasted this instrument 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 57 

of torture and cruelty ; and though puny man has 
attempted to resuscitate and bring it to its old use, this 
breath blows upon it, and it shrinks back into its insig- 
nificance, abashed and deadened, as if cognizant of the 
degrading use to which it had been applied. But the 
care of God, at the same time that this fatal work was 
done, had before filled the granaries of the husband- 
man, at least over the civilized world, to an overflowing 
abundance ; and while he had been doing this He also 
prepared the hearts of these husbandmen, all over the 
Christian world, to rise in one simultaneous mass, and 
pour into this famished land the fruits of their har- 
vests ; so that — shall it be said, for future generations 
to read, — that it rotted in the harbors while the dying 
were falling in the streets, for want of it 1 Yes, un- 
hesitatingly may it be said, that there was not a week 
during that famine, but there was sufficient food for the 
wants of that week, and more than sufficient. Was 
there then a " God's famine' 5 in Ireland, in 1846-7- 
8-9, and so on ? No ! it is all mockery to call it so, 
and mockery which the Almighty will expose, before 
man will believe, and be humbled as he ought to be. 
It is therefore I say, may I never be on such an emi- 
nence again, from such a cause, from one which, if its 
breaking forth could not have been foreseen or pre- 
vented, need never have resulted in the loss of a single 
life. 

The principle of throwing away life to-day, lest 
means to protect it to-morrow might be lessened, was 
fully and practically carried on and carried out. 



CHAPTER III. 



" Man's a king — his throne is Duty 
Since his work on earth hegan." 



The responsibility of a stewardship is a great one, 
and doubly so where the results are connected with life 
as well as property ; and where the last is in the hand 
of the steward, who at option, may save or destroy the 
former. Had a commission been intrusted to me, 
under certain restrictions, and a salary paid, on condi- 
tion of a right performance of duty, the path would 
have been open and plain ; but working for no reward, 
under no restrictions but conscience, in the midst of 
the "valley and shadow of death," emphatically, where 
some would stumble and fall, and where all had an 
equal claim upon the bounties which were to be applied, 
was a fearful task. This task must be entered upon, 
and the first duty, after securing a room for a deposit, 
was to find suitable objects — by this is implied objects 
which were not only needy, but which, in the jumble of 
so much machinery as was attached to so many different 
Associations, were overlooked. These Associations 
had now multiplied to such an extent, that the time in 
getting the varied instruments into harmonious action 
was considerable ; many died in sight of boilers pre- 



ANNALS OF THE FAMINE. 59 

paring to feed the hungry, or when prepared, they must 
wait till the " Relieving Officer had time to enter their 
names on the books." 

I stopped for no books, knowing that a faithful un- 
erring record would be kept in the council chamber 
above, where the rich and the poor would soon meet 
before the Maker of them all ; and my only prayer was, 
that when that book should be opened, I should not find 
there noted the name of any who had gone before as a 
witness of my neglect. 

Cook street furnished a tolerable supply; and the 
remainder I found scattered in desolate places ; some 
who had despaired of relief, because having neither 
courage nor strength, to make their way through the 
tumultuous revolting crowds which congregated about 
every place of public relief, submitted to their fate 
with a patient coolness and apparent resignation, which 
I have never been able to comprehend. One woman I 
found sitting in her chamber, looking respectably clean ; 
upon inquiry into her real condition, the facts proved to 
be these ; — she had heard of the Government Relief, 
and had exhausted the last farthing for food, and when 
hunger became pressing, she sought her way timidly to 
the Relieving Officer's station, and made her wants 
known ; she was then suffering extremely, but she was 
sent away with the promise that he would call in the 
morning and make inquiries, and if he found her worthy 
she should have her name entered into the " books ;" 
she went to bed supperless, and arose the next morning, 
waiting for the officer — he came not ; she feared if she 



60 ANNALS OF THE 

should go out he would call, and then she should lose 
her opportunity ; that night she went to her bed with- 
out the least relief; the next day she did the same; 
the third morning I found her in that state of patient 
suffering, with her mind fully made up to die, without 
making any further effort. 

These facts are recorded to show the incomprehen- 
sible features of that famine; and to inquire of the 
Christian, the philosopher, and the physiologist, what is 
the nature of that kind of suffering, which could bring 
the mind into such a cool passive frame, especially to 
operate so upon a nation naturally impetuous in their 
passions, and keenly alive to the tenderest sensibilities 
of the heart. Was it their hereditary suffering that 
had become a second nature — was it the peculiarity 
belonging to hunger alone — or was it their religion, that 
had produced that submissiveness which overcame the 
natural propensities, and brought them into passive 
obedience, when the hand of affliction pressed them 
sore? 

My first donation was Indian meal, with a few 
pounds of money. A store-room was made of my 
lodging apartment, which was three floors from the 
ground ; the carpet was removed ; the meal which had 
been put in sacks, by the order of government, was 
getting heated, and much of it must be emptied. The 
government had, for reasons which are not fully un- 
derstood by all, sent to Ireland sacks which were sold 
for half-a-crown each — the meal was taken from the 
barrels and deposited in them, which answered two 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 61 

purposes, it made sale for thousands of sacks, at a 
tolerable profit, and was an effectual method of heating 
the meal, which soon gathered dampness, then became 
mouldy and wholly unfit for use. The hungry, in some 
cases, took it gladly ; the consequences in many in- 
stances were fatal, producing a state of the system 
often beyond the power of nature or medicine to cure. 

The meal sent from New York was of the best kind, 
the hull being taken off, and the meal kiln-dried, 
which had it been left in barrels, would have remained 
for a year or more in good order. This, the govern- 
ment, being unacquainted with the nature of the article, 
probably did not understand. If the inquiry be made 
— Why did the government interfere with donations 
sent to the " Dublin Central Committee, 3 ' as dona- 
tions ? — the answer can only be, that they must have 
acted upon one of two principles ; that as they paid 
the freight of the American grants, they had a right to 
use a little dictation in the arrangement, in order to 
secure a partial remuneration ; or, they must have acted 
upon the principle, that their interference would for- 
ward the exertions making in behalf of their subjects. 
Is the inquiry made — What became of the barrels? 
— why every commercial man knows the use of these 
articles in trade, and every housekeeper who has ever 
had a broken one, knows the convenience of making a 
rapid fire to hasten her dinner. What became of all 
the tens of thousands of sacks, or in other words, who 
paid for them? For one, I must answer, that when 
mine were delivered through the " Central Committee," 



62 ANNALS OF THE 

a promise was made, that the money paid for them 
should be refunded when the sacks were returned. 
This was immediately done ; but the money was with- 
held with no other explanation, but that I must sell 
meal enough to pay for them. This meal was the prop- 
erty of the poor, and a property most sacred, because 
life was suspended on it, and the meal was sent in the 
best manner to preserve it, and taking it out injured it 
most seriously, and sometimes fatally, and the article 
taken from their hungry mouths to pay for sacks, was, 
besides robbing them of their own, deducting so much 
from life. I could not, I dare not, and I did not 
comply. 

This circumstance is important, not only because 
it involves a great principle, but as furnishing a solu- 
tion, as far as it goes, why the poor were so little ben- 
efited by the bounties sent them from abroad. The 
hungry, it should be borne in mind, for whom these 
donations were sent, had no control of what was vir- 
tually their own exclusively, but must be content to 
receive it by proxy, in great or small parcels, in a good 
or bad state, at the dispenser's option; consequently, 
they did not always have what belonged to them, and 
if the meal and rice paid for the sacks, as mine were 
required to do, a great deduction must be made from 
the original amount. I once heard a woman observe, 
whose husband had large donations intrusted to him, 
that they had <£200 worth of sacks, which must be 
paid for out of the meal, as they could not do it. 
These two facts are the only tangible ones on this sub- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 63 

ject, which came under my cognizance. I name them, 
not to expose faults which should be concealed, nor to 
find fault for the gratification of doing so ; but reading 
in a book often quoted for its veracity, that " on the 
side of the oppressor there was power, but they had no 
comforter," conscience compels me to throw into the 
scale every particle of truth which belongs to the poor, 
who have been so much accused of ingratitude toward 
their benefactors. They never were ungrateful to their 
real benefactors ; but second-handed ones, like me, who 
had power intrusted, did not all of them act wisely, 
nor for the best good of the poor at all times. Some 
of this was ignorance ; some who did not know how to 
prepare the food sent it to them in the most economical 
way; and others, who had never felt hunger, took 
care to guard their own stomachs in good time against 
its attacks, which necessarily required much free feed- 
ing and drinking to keep up health and strength for the 
arduous work ; consequently all this caused delay, and 
twenty -four, forty-eight, and often more hours, were 
the starving obliged to wait till their time should come 
to be served. 

My labors were constant, but not complex, having 
arranged that eight in the morning must be the time 
for giving the donations, and that a delay till nine on 
the part of the beneficiaries, would debar them the 
twenty-four hours' supply. They had all been lectured 
and duly trained previously, that if any appeared dirty, 
or brought a fresh beneficiary without my knowledge, 
they should forfeit their own donations. The require- 



64 ANNALS OF THE 

ment of eight o'clock attendance was necessary, because 
my visits in Cook street were requisite through the 
day, and I was obliged to rise at four in the morning 
to copy manuscript and correct proof sheets till seven ; 
then my penny roll was taken, and all put in due read- 
iness for the distribution. The rooms below me were 
occupied as offices, which were opened at nine, and the 
appearance of bare feet, tatters, and sacks of meal, 
would not be at all in unison with the refinement of 
gentlemen ; and above all it was done so early, that the 
train of beggars, which would have been drawn at any 
other hour, was avoided. Thus, every hour was time 
occupied, without the least self-denial. The greatest 
suffering was, during the few hours devoted to sleep, 
when I was occasionally awakened by hearing some 
moan of distress under my window. My lodging-places 
in Ireland had been sometimes of quite a peculiar kind ; 
and here, in the beautiful city of Dublin, in a tall house 
overlooking the Liffey, was my proud heritage — my bed 
was a short sofa, or apology for one, placed in the 
middle of barrels of meal, spread upon blankets on the 
floor, and one crazy old chair, which served to make 
out my lodging at night, and provide a seat while copy- 
ing manuscripts ; an old deal table, with a New York 
Tribune for a table-cloth, made up the furniture of 
that happy room. But this bliss was limited, every 
day the quantity of meal lessened, and my purse grew 
lighter. The poor looked on, and said, " Praise God, 
we shall all be destrawed;" but God was better to 
them than their fears — they did not die. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 65 

Mine was more than a happy lot. Never before in 
all my privations in Ireland, had I tested the value of 
being early trained under the discipline of a rational 
mother, who fitted me, when a child, for the exigencies 
of life ; who not only by precept taught me, that in 
going through the journey of this world I should meet 
with rough roads and stormy weather, and not always 
have a covered carriage ; that sometimes I should have 
a hot supper, sometimes a cold one — sometimes a wel- 
come greeting, and sometimes a repulsive one ; but she 
had instructed me too, by precept and example, that 
my hands were to be employed in all that was useful, 
and that idleness was both disgraceful and sinful. This 
practical knowledge was never more extensively useful 
to me than now ; knowing how to prepare the Indian 
meal and rice so that it was palatable, and no waste. 
Yet with these appliances, the meal at last failed. No 
skill in cooking would make it last like the widow's barrel ; 
and though I had learned not to distrust, yet it cannot 
be said that I felt the same animation in giving out the 
last day's mess as the first. I had a little money left, 
and the weather was getting warmer : a portion, at least, 
of what had been wanted for fuel, could be reserved for 
food. I hoped that on the ocean there might be some- 
thing destined for me ; though not the least intimation 
was given to these poor ones, but they were urged to 
apply to some of the Relief Associations. 

One unfortunate man was the only one that died who 
had received any aid from me ; and his life was for- 
getfully left to go gradually out, when it might have 



bb ANNALS OF THE 

been saved. A curate called and found him recruiting 
from the last stage of starvation in which I first found 
him, and kindly gave him a little money and food, 
promising that he would provide for him in future, and 
relieve me, as so many were on my hands. The curate 
forgot him. Three weeks after I called to see him ; — 
a girl of two years was dying on a litter of straw in the 
corner, nestled by the emaciated father, who was too 
weak to know the suffering of his child ; and in two 
days they were both dead. He had been " forgotten 
by his neighbors," his wife was in the hospital ; he sat 
waiting, as was common, in patient hope, till death 
relieved him. 

Cases of death were not so common in Dublin as in 
many cities ; the Society of Friends did much to stay 
the plague, and their work was carried on by different 
means ; their laborers, in most cases, were volunteers, 
who asked no reward but that of doing good. How 
many of the poor bless the name of William Forster, 
and Joseph Crosfield, from England, for their labors of 
love ; who, on the 28th of December, 1846, reached 
Dublin, made their object known to that Committee, 
whose views and operations harmonized, and thence 
they proceeded on their mission of love and mercy. 
Their graphic report is before the world, as well as 
others of that denomination of Christians, James Luke, 
Marcus Goodbody, William Dillwyn Sims, and Wil- 
liam Todhunter. These men, moved by high and lofty 
feelings, spent no time in idle commenting on the Pro- 
testant or Papist faith — the Radical, Whig, or Tory 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 67 

politics ; but looked at things as they were, and faith- 
fully recorded what they saw. Not only did they re- 
cord, but they relieved. They talked and wrote, but 
acted more ; and such a lasting impression have their 
labors left, that the next summer, as I followed in their 
wake through the country, the name of the " blessed 
William Forster" was on the lips of the poor cabiners, 
and it was from their testimony that his name and 
good deeds first reached me. William Bennett, too, 
passed six weeks in Ireland, and a clear and concise 
account was recorded by himself, of the state of the 
famine; though his own beneficence, which was not 
scanty, has not been definitely known, because he acted 
as an individual ; therefore he was not responsible to 
any society. As the pestilence followed the famine, the 
entire country seemed to be sinking into the vortex, 
and a knowledge of Ireland was gaining by all classes 
of people, both in and out of the country. An innova- 
tion was made, promising good results, into the long- 
established habits and condition of that people, which 
nothing before had done. Poverty was divested of 
every mask ; and from the mud cabin to the estated 
gentleman's abode, all strangers who wished, without 
the usual circuitous ceremony, could gain access. The 
landlord, who had long sported at his ease, was begin- 
ning to pay a penalty of which he had never dreamed ; 
the tree, which was planted centuries ago, was now be- 
ginning to yield an exuberant crop ; the starved tenants 
are driven into the " Union," or turned defenseless 
into the storm, and, in either case, the rents were left 



00 ANNALS OF THE 

unpaid. The landlord growls, but growls in vain : the 
" lazy dogs," who are not in the poor-house, drawing 
enormous rates from his extensive farms, are at his 
doors, begging bread, or lying dead under his windows, 
waiting for " the board to be put on 'em," as they 
called a coffin. Coffins were now becoming scarce, 
and in the mountainous regions and islands, two rough 
boards, with the corpse, in the rags which were about 
it when the breath departed, placed between these, and 
a straw rope wound about, was the coveted boon which 
clung to them to the last. 

The winter passed, but the spring brought no fresh 
hopes ; onward was the fearful march — many faces 
that were ruddy, and limbs that were robust, and 
hearts that had scarcely had a fear that the wolf would 
enter their dwelling, now began to fade, stumble, and 
finally sink under the pursuer. My purse was low, my 
meal gone, when a letter, the choicest and best, arrived, 
written by a teacher of a pauper school in New York, 
and signed by the Corresponding Committee there of 
the Dublin Friends' Society, transmitting me a few 
barrels of meal, from the children of that pauper 
school. This was an offering richer than all, it was 
the interest of the widow's mite, coming through the 
channel of the orphans, whose willing hearts and ready 
hands had gathered from their scanty comforts a few 
pounds without solicitation, and begged the privilege to 
send it to me. It came : I had previously been in- 
formed that a school in the poorest convent in Dublin 
was in a state of the greatest suffering. These schools 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 69 

were composed of children who had no means of sup- 
port, many of them orphans, or the offspring of parents 
reduced to beggary, and gathered into convents and 
other schools of charity, where they were fed once 
a day. The nuns were of the order belonging to 
the poor, and in time of plenty had only been able 
to feed sixteen daily ; and when some hundreds were 
added, the distress was almost overwhelming. This 
donation, coming from children of the poorest emigrants 
in New York, particularly belonged to such as were in 
like condition, for if such children were turned from 
the schools, many, and most of them, must inevitably 
perish, notwithstanding the Friends' Society were act- 
ing with the greatest vigilance. The British Associ- 
ation, too, was in motion ; besides the Government had 
been bountiful. America was doing much — private 
individuals, of the Irish in America, and in all other 
countries where they were scattered, were sending one 
continued train of remittances, to the utter astonish- 
ment of the postmasters ; yet death sharpened his 
teeth daily, for new victims. With gladness of heart 
I hastened to the committee -rooms — presented the let- 
ter — was requested to wait an answer till the next day ; 
the next day another day was demanded ; called the 
third day, and was denied in toto. The clerk returned 
the letter without an explanation, only saying, that 
" the committee had concluded not to grant it." Had 
I that moment been summoned by a policeman, to ap- 
pear before a court, and answer to a charge of swind- 
ling or fraud, I could not have been more astonished, 



70 ANNALS OF THE 

and certainly not so disappointed, for my heart had 
been most intensely fixed on this, as the most sacred 
offering ever sent me. The deep sense of injustice 
which was felt, drew these remarks : — That if the 
Americans had misplaced their confidence, in sending 
remittances through that channel, I was sorry that I 
had requested them to send mine in that way, and 
would immediately write them to desist. No other ex- 
planation was given than a plain decided denial ; but 
when I had passed the door, the solution began to open. 
The fault was mine, God had sent me to Ireland, in 
His own way, and instructed me to lean entirely on 
Him ; His promises had never failed toward me — 
nothing had been wanted, but had been supplied to my 
wonderment ; and now, when daily He had been ex- 
plaining for what purpose I had been sent hither, that 
I should lean to the creature, and ask aid, which in 
reality was not needed, and only retarded my opera- 
tions, He had sent a rebuke upon my unbelief, which 
silenced the severity I at first felt toward those instru- 
ments in whose hands I had foolishly placed myself. I 
do not censure them, they acted from motives no mat- 
ter to me ; and God might have used them as a cor- 
rective most effectual, because in them I had placed 
both confidence and power, which were in safer hands 
before. Man may do well, but God can do better ; 
and it would be fulsome flattery to say, that the " Cen- 
tral Committee of Dublin" were infallible ; and cruel 
injustice to assert, that they did not act effectually, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 71 

liberally, and, taken as a whole, do the best that was 
done. 

On my way home, with my rejected letter in my 
hand, Richard Webb met me, took the letter, and en- 
tered the committee -room ; what barriers he removed 
I know not, but the meal was sent. This was the only 
co-working that I attempted in Ireland ; not because 
my strength and wisdom were complete, but because 
they were so inefficient, that an Almighty arm was 
requisite to effect the object. 

The next morning early I went to the convent. They 
knew not of my object ; but learning that I was an 
American, — " Bless God," said the Abbess, " that I 
see one of that nation, to say how much we owe in this 
convent to their liberality. These children here must 
have died, but for what they have sent them ; and this 
morning they have assembled to receive the last bit we 
can give, and we have been saying that we should be 
ashamed to ask from the Americans any more, had we 
an opportunity to do so." They then led me into the 
school-room, and called the attention of the children to 
see one of that kind nation who had fed them through 
the winter, and that through me they must send thanks 
to my people. They were then told what the pauper 
children of New York had sent — children like them, 
who were poor, but who saved all the pence they could 
procure, and had sent the little gathering to them. I 
have not the least doubt, had the benevolent friends of 
that " Dublin Central Committee" witnessed the happy 
scene of joy and gratitude which was there manifested, 



72 ANNALS OF THE 

they would have better understood my feelings, and re- 
joiced too. 

July 6th, I took the steamer for Belfast. Here was 
a work going on, which was paramount to all I had seen. 
Women were at work ; and no one could justly say that 
they were dilatory or inefficient. Never in Ireland, 
since the famine, was such a happy combination of all 
parties, operating so harmoniously together, as was here 
manifested. Not in the least like the women of Dublin, 
who sheltered themselves behind their old societies — 
most of them excusing themselves from personal labor, 
feeling that a few visits to the abodes of the poor were 
too shocking for female delicacy to sustain ; and though 
occasionally one might be prevailed upon to go out, yet 
but for a few days could I ever persuade any to ac- 
company me. Yet much was given in Dublin ; for it is 
a city celebrated for its benevolence, and deservedly so, 
as far as giving goes. But giving and doing are an- 
tipodes in her who has never been trained to domestic 
duties. The faithful John Gregg thundered his power- 
ful anathemas on the indolent in God's vineyard, who 
labored not among the poor, nor descended to the duties 
of women in emergencies like this. They heard ifc : 
some said it was beautiful ; some declared he was the 
most witty man they ever heard ; and others said his 
remarks were quite amusing ; — but how many ever 
through the week were influenced to practice his preach- 
ing, eternity will best tell. 

The Belfast Ladies' Association embraced an object 
which lives and tells, and will continue to do so, when 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 73 

they who formed it shall be no more on earth. It was 
on January 1st, 1847, that the first meeting was held 
in the Commercial Buildings, by ladies of all religious 
denominations ; and they there resolved to form a So- 
ciety, for the purpose of raising a fund to be appropri- 
ated to afflicted localities, without any regard to religious 
distinctions. Visiting soon commenced, under the titles 
of Corresponding Committee, Industrial Committee, 
Clothing Committee, and Collecting Committee. With- 
out inserting the names of these indefatigable ladies, it 
may be recorded that more than one hundred and fifty 
were associated in this work ; the highways and hedges 
were faithfully visited, the poor sought out, their con- 
dition cared for, and the children of the most degraded 
class were taken and placed in a school, which continues 
to flourish on an extensive scale. This school has the 
benefit of being taught the elementary branches of an 
education, and the most useful needlework and knitting ; 
and the squalid looks of the children were soon ex- 
changed for health, and that indifference to appearance 
which the hungry, neglected poor soon wear, was, like 
magic almost, transformed into a becoming tidiness and 
self-respect. 

Though many had never before known anything of 
sewing or knitting, yet they soon produced specimens 
praiseworthy to teacher and scholar, and by this in- 
dustry earned a little each week which they could call 
their own. Other schools of the kind multiplied in al- 
most every part of Ireland, especially in Connaught, 
where the exertions of Dr. Edgar, who explored this 
4 



74 ANNALS OF THE 

province, have been a great blessing in this respect. 
Many a poor child by these schools has been made to 
look up with a hope which was entirely new — a hope 
that in after days she might wear a shawl and a bonnet, 
write a good letter, make a dress, &c. The happy 
effects of industry on the minds of the children were 
striking. That passive indifference to all but how a 
morsel of bread should be obtained, was exchanged for 
a becoming manner and animated countenance, lighted 
up by the happy consciousness that industry was a 
stepping-stone which would justly and honorably give 
them a place among the comfortable and respectable of 
the earth. And again, to quote Dr. Edgar, every look 
seemed to say, " They have had in their work a full 
reward." And he adds, " Thus an independent, self- 
supporting, and useful generation may be raised, who 
will be less at the mercy of changing seasons ; and who, 
when the day of trouble comes, will have some resources 
on which to draw." 

My greatest object in writing this sketch of the 
famine being to show its effects on all classes, rather 
than to detail scenes of death by starvation, a few 
sketches only of this kind in passing along v\jill be given, 
for the purpose of illustrating the principle of mind as 
it developes itself in the varied changes through which 
it is called to pass. These Industrial Schools, which I 
afterward visited when passing through Connaught in 
1847 and 1848, were subjects of the deepest interest ; 
for to me they told the whole story of Ireland's wrongs 
and Ireland's remedy. They told me, that when usur- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 75 

pation robbed them of the means of industry, for their 
own good, that oppression confined this industry to the 
personal benefits of the oppressor, and thus deadened 
every natural excitement to labor, which promised no- 
thing but a bare subsistence among the children of men 
who looked down with contempt upon them, because, 
by this " hewing of wood and drawing of water," they 
had been kept in degraded, unrequited servitude ; but 
now that an industry, founded on righteous principles, 
was springing up — an industry that not only rewarded 
but elevated — the convenient term, " lazy Irish," was 
hiding its slanderous head. 

The Belfast Association felt this more and more, as 
they received returns from Connaught of the happy 
effects of these schools, and their hearts were more and 
more encouraged in pursuing these labors of love. 
They met often, they planned, they talked together of 
the best means to accomplish the most good ; and one 
great beauty of these meetings was, no one said to her 
sister, " Stand by, for I am holier than thou." Dif- 
ferent parties who had never mingled, now felt one 
common interest. She who had much brought in of her 
abundance, and she who had little brought in her mite. 
While these benevolent women were teaching the prac- 
tice of industry to the poor, they found the benefit react 
upon themselves, for they too must be industrious. 
This new, this arduous, long-neglected work, required 
not only their skill but their energies, to put and keep 
the vast machinery in motion. Money was not all that 
was requisite in the work. The abodes of the most 



76 ANNALS OF THE 

wretched must be visited ; and, though before the fa- 
mine they had scarcely dreamed of the suffering that 
was in their city, and could not believe that their intel- 
ligent, industrious town was in much real want, when 
they found that many uncomplaining children of distress 
had been struggling for life long before the famine, they 
doubled if possible their energies, and cheerfully showed 
by individual exertion, that if they had previously over- 
looked this pleasing duty, they would repair as far as 
possible all that had been neglected before on their 
part. The men, too, showed themselves efficient co- 
workers ; they contributed, many of them bountifully, 
and some visited too. They erected a bath-house for 
the benefit of laborers and the poor of all classes, to 
which was attached a laundress, that the poor in the 
most economical way could be provided with materials 
for this important handmaid to health and respecta- 
bility — cleanliness . 

I loved to linger in Belfast. All seemed to be life, 
and life to some purpose. All hearts seemed to be 
awakened to one and the same object, to do good most 
efficiently ; and one peculiar trait was here perceivable 
— none of that desire for who should be greatest seemed 
prevalent. A mutual confidence prevailed. One would 
tell me enthusiastically, that she did not know how the 
association could manage without Maria Webb ; her 
judgment was always the turning point in all difficulties. 
Maria Webb would expatiate on the efficiency of Mary 
Ireland, as a visitor and manager ; a third would re- 
gret that the indefatigable Miss M'Cracken, she feared, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 77 

would soon leave us, as her age had passed the line of 
three-score years and ten ; another expatiated on the 

faithful Miss , who was a Roman Catholic, but 

whose labors of love had been untiring ; and she was 
quite sorry that difference in religious profession had 
so long kept so many useful members at a distance, 
&c. This to a stranger, could probably be viewed with 
a sober, impartial eye, that those moving in the ma- 
chinery could not ; and to me it looked like a heavenly 
influence distilling unperceived into the hearts of all, 
like the dew, which falls alike on the garden flower or 
mountain weed. 

Another most valuable principle was illustrated by 
this famine, which a God-loving heart must admire, 
viz., the difference between a hireling and a voluntary 
worker, and so clear was this difference, that whenever, 
in going the length of Ireland, I met any of either class 
upon coaches, in trains, visiting the poor, or distribut- 
ing donations in soup-shops, or elsewhere, a mistake 
was not once made in pronouncing who was a paid offi- 
cer, or who was there moved by an innate voice, to do 
what he could for the poor. Allow me to dwell a little 
on this and make it as clear as I can. 

An officer paid by government was generally well 
paid, consequently he could take the highest seat in a 
public conveyance, he sought for the most comfortable 
inns, where he could secure the best dinner and wines ; 
he inquired the state of the people, and did not visit the 
dirty hovels himself when he could find a menial who 
would for a trifle perform it ; and though sometimes 



78 ANNALS OF THE 

when accident forced him in contact with the dying or 
dead, his pity was stirred, it was mingled with the 
curse which always follows : " Laziness and filth, and he 
wondered why the dirty wretches had lived so long ; 
and he hoped this lesson would teach them to work in 
future, and lay up something as other people did." 
When his plan of operation was prepared, his shop 
opened, and books arranged, and the applications of the 
starving were numerous, he peremptorily silenced this, 
and sent away that without relief; many who had 
walked miles without food for twenty-four hours, and 
some died on their way home, or soon after reaching it ; 
and when the story was told him, and he entreated to 
look into the cases of such, the answer was, that he 
must be true to the government, and not give out to 
any whose names he had not entered into the books ; if 
they died how could he help it, &c. If all did not do 
precisely as has been stated, all manifested a similar 
spirit, more or less. 

The Hon. William Butler, who was appointed as an 
overseer by government, was an exception, so far as 
language was concerned ; he spoke feelingly, but his 
personal habits were not brought to that test of many 
with a lower station ; he acted kindly as an inspector, 
and devised the best means which he could, and I was 
informed, when making the inquiry respecting his dis- 
tinguished humanity, that he accepted his appointment 
from principle, and not from necessity, that he might 
see that justice was better administered. 

Let us now follow the self-moved or heavenly -moved 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 79 

donor. He was found mingling with the poorest, often 
taking the lowest seat, curtailing all unnecessary ex- 
pense that he might have more to give, seeking out the 
most distressed ; looking into the causes of distress, that 
he might better know how to remove them, never up- 
braiding with harshness, and always seeking some apol- 
ogy for their misdoings, when representing their case 
to the uninformed. Many, both men and women, 
among this class, took most responsible donations with- 
out any reward, and acted in the kindest and most 
judicious manner ; always minding to serve first those 
who needed most and had come the farthest. This 
kindly spirit was reciprocated at once by the poor, and 
with an astonishing discernment they often manifested 
this knowledge ; sometimes much to the uneasiness of 
the party who were guilty. Through the whole of the 
famine, I never heard any of the poor complain of one 
who was giving from his own purse, and seeking out his 
own objects ; nor, on the other hand, did I ever hear 
one say, who gave him true benevolence, that he ever 
met ingratitude. This might have been, but I speak 
only from personal observation. 

While stopping in Belfast, at the hospitable " White 
House, " so called, owned by the family of Grimshaws, 
I became acquainted with a Miss Hewitson, whose 
father resided in Donegal. My destiny was to that 
county ; hearing that the distress there was very great, 
I wished to see it. 

William Bennett and his son had visited that part, 
in March, distributing donations at his own expense 



80 ANNALS OF THE 

mostly, and his painful descriptions had awakened a 
strong desire to see for myself, and though I had no 
means in hand, I had reason to hope that there might 
be some on the ocean. I took the coach for Derry, a 
few miles from that town. The mother of Miss Hewit- 
son was to meet me in her own carriage, and conduct 
me to her house in Rossgarrow. Derry had not suf- 
fered so much as many other towns, and a stranger 
passing through would not notice any particular change 
from its condition in past years. But this little relief 
was only to make what followed appear the more pain- 
ful. Mrs. Hewitson met me with her son, and we took 
tea at a delightful little mansion on the sloping side of 
one of Ireland's green lawns, looking down upon a 
beautiful lake. " And is there," I asked, " on this 
pretty spot, misery to be found ?" — " Come and see," 
was the answer of my kind friend. It was twilight 
when we stepped into the carriage, and few painful ob- 
jects met us till "we reached her dwelling. 

Her paternal cottage was nestled in a pretty wood, 
its roof thatched, and its windows shaded by the creep- 
ing vine in front. On one end, a window gave one of 
the most beautiful peeps upon a lake that can be im- 
agined ; and the back contained a garden which was 
one of the most pleasant retreats I had met, for the 
gooseberry was just ripe. Here had this discreet, this 
" virtuous woman," lived, and by precept and example 
trained a family of sons and daughters, which will, 
which do arise and call her blessed. Her husband had 
been an officer, and was then receiving a small pension, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 81 

and during the first season of the famine had been em- 
ployed by government as an overseer of the Board of 
Works. His heart had sickened at the scenes which 
came under his eye, some sketches of which have been 
before the public. 

The morning lighted up a pretty cottage, well or- 
dered, and the breakfast-table presented a treat un- 
seen before by me in Ireland. Instead of the bread, 
butter, tea, and egg, which are the height of the best 
Irish breakfast, there was a respectable corn-cake, 
made as it should be, suitable accompaniments of all 
kinds, with the best of cream for me ; and were it not 
that the hungry had then commenced their daily usages 
of assembling in crowds about the house for food, that 
breakfast would have been a pleasant one. When I 
ascertained that her husband had been in America, and 
from him she had been told of the virtues of corn-cake, 
and that her skill had been exercised till she had 
brought it to perfection — I valued it if possible still 
more. Had the Irish mothers throughout Ireland man- 
aged as did this woman, their task in the famine would 
have been much lighter — the poor, many more of them, 
would have been saved, and multitudes who have gone 
down might have retained their standing. Had the 
higher classes known how to have changed the meal 
into the many palatable shapes contrived by this eco- 
nomical housekeeper, when the wheaten loaf was so 
high, immense money might have been saved to all 
parties. It was brought in such disrepute by bad 
cooking, that many would be ashamed to be found eat- 
4* 



82 ANNALS OF THE 

ing it, and one man who was begging most earnestly 
for food, when offered some of this prepared in Irish 
style, turned away in contempt, saying, " No, thank 
God, I've never been brought to ate the yeller indian." 

This industrious woman, like Solomon's prudent 
wife, had not only risen " while it was yet dark," to 
prepare meat for her household, but she had been in 
her meal-room at four in the morning, weighing out 
meal for the poor, the Society of Friends in Dublin 
having furnished her with grants. This I found was 
her daily practice, while the poor through the day made 
the habitation a nucleus not of the most pleasant kind. 
The lower window-frame in the kitchen was of board 
instead of glass, this all having been broken by the 
pressure of faces continually there. 

Who could eat, who could work, who could read, or 
who could play in such circumstances as these ? Cer- 
tainly it sometimes seemed that the sunshine was 
changed, that the rain gave a stranger pattering, and 
truly, that the wind did moan most dolefully. The 
dogs ceased their barking, there were scarcely any 
cocks to be heard crowing in the morning, and the glad- 
some mirth of children everywhere ceased. ! ye, 
whose nerves are disturbed at the glee of the loud- 
laughing boy, come to this land of darkness and death, 
and for leagues you may travel, and in house or cabin, 
by the wayside, on the hill-top, or upon the meadow, 
you shall not see a smile, you shall not see the sprightly 
foot running in ecstacy after the rolling hoop, leaping 
the ditch or tossing the ball. The young laughing full 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 83 

faces, and brilliant eyes, and buoyant limbs, had be- 
come walking-skeletons of death ! When I saw one 
approaching, with his emaciated fingers locked together 
before him, his body in a bending position, as all gene- 
rally crawled along, if I had neither bread nor money 
to give, I turned from the path ; for, instead of the 
" God save ye kindly," or " Ye look wary, lady," which 
had ever been the salutation to me on the mountains, I 
knew it would be the imploring look or the vacant 
sepulchral stare, which, when once fastened upon you, 
leaves its impress for ever. The kind Hewitsons 
seemed not only to anticipate my wants, but to enter 
into my feelings as a stranger whose heart was tortured 
with unparalleled scenes of suffering, and they did all to 
make my stay pleasant, and if possible to draw away 
my mind a little from the painful objects around me. 
They conducted me from place to place, and showed 
me much of the beautiful scenery with which Donegal 
abounds, as well as all Ireland. Lakes bountifully dot 
this part of Donegal. Rathmelton, Milford, Letter- 
kenny, Dunfanaghy, all lie in this region, as well as a 
romantic spot on the sea-shore, called M' Sweeny's 
Gun, so called on account of the report that the sea 
makes when it rushes with tremendous force under the 
rock which overhangs it, and through which a round 
hole has been made, and as the waves dash, shooting 
through, high into the air, a loud report, like that of a 
gun, is heard ; but as natural curiosities are not the 
object of this sketch, they cannot be dwelt upon : curi- 
osities of a most unnatural and fearful kind have fallen 



84 ANNALS OF THE 

to my share. As fond as I had always been of looking 
upon the grandeur of the sea-coast in Ireland, "which 
has no rival probably, taken as a whole ; now the in- 
terest was so deadened, by the absence of the kindly 
children, who were always ready to point out every spot 
of interest, and give its name, that a transient look suf- 
ficed. At Letterkenny, the Roman Catholic Bishop 
invited us to his house, and treated us with much cour- 
tesy ; showed us his robes and badges of honor, given 
him at Rome ; and though he knew that we were Pro- 
testants, yet he appeared not to suspect but that we 
should be as deeply interested as though we were under 
his jurisdiction. Many favorable opportunities present- 
ed, to become acquainted with the effects of the famine 
upon the Romish priests. Some were indefatigable, and 
died in their labors ; while others looked more passively 
on. They had two drawbacks which the Protestants in 
general had not. — First, a great proportion of them are 
quite poor ; and second, they, in the first season of the 
famine, were not intrusted with grants, as the Protest- 
ants were. These difficulties operated strongly upon 
the minds of the benevolent class among them. One 
Protestant clergyman informed me, that so much confi- 
dence had he in the integrity of the Catholic priest in 
his parish, that when he had a large grant sent to him, 
he offered as much of it to the priest as he could distri- 
bute, knowing, he added, that it would be done with the 
greatest promptitude and fidelity. No ministers of re- 
ligion in the world know as much of their people as do 
the Catholics, not one of their flock is forgotten, scarce- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 85 

ly by name, however poor or degraded ; and conse- 
quently when the famine came, they had not to search out 
the poor, they knew the identical cabin in which every 
starving one was lying, and as far as knowledge was 
concerned were in a condition to act most effectually. 

My next visit was to the far-famed Gweedore, the 
estate of Lord George Hill. This gentleman is too 
well-known to need a description. His works will live 
when he is where the " wicked cease from troubling." 
His facts on Gweedore are the most amusing of any- 
thing I have read on the habits of the Irish ; and to 
understand what Lord George Hill has done, whoever 
visits that spot should first read these "facts," and 
then all objections must be silenced respecting the ca- 
pacity of the most savage of that nation being elevated. 
These "facts" I had never read till some time after 
my visit there, which I now much regret. It would not 
be supposed that during a famine this spot could be 
seen to much advantage ; but there was, even then, a 
degree of comfort which did not exist in any other part 
I had seen. It lies in the parish of Tullaghobegly, on 
the north-west coast of Ireland, where the wildest 
scenery stretches along the bold coast, in many places ; 
and where it would seem that man, unless driven from 
the society of his fellow-being, would never think of 
making his abode. But here men had clustered, and 
here they had constructed rude huts, of loose stone or 
turf, and with but little law, they were a " law to 
themselves," each one doing as he listed. The system 
of Rundale prevailed, " one tenant had his proportion 



86 ANNALS OF THE 

in thirty or forty different places, and without fences 
between them ;" and the strips were often so small, 
that half a stone of oats would sow one of these divisions ; 
and these " Gweedore facts" tell us that one poor man 
had his inheritance in thirty-two different places, and 
abandoned, in despair, the effort to make them out. 
There were no resident landlords, the rent was paid 
any how, or not at all, as the tenant was disposed. 
Sometimes a little was picked up, as they termed it, by 
some agent going from cabin to cabin, and receiving 
what each might please to give. Their evenings were 
passed in each other's huts, till late at night, telling 
stories, drinking potteen, &c. Perpetual quarrels arose 
from the Rundale system ; for the cattle, on a certain 
day, were brought from the mountain, to graze on the 
arable land ; and if Mikey or Paddy had not his crops 
gathered, they were injured, and then a fight set mat- 
ters at rest again. The animals, too, were often divid- 
ed, according to the Rundale system : if four men, for 
instance, owned a horse, each must provide a shoe ; in 
one case, but three men had a share in one, consequent- 
ly the unshod foot got lame ; a dispute arose, one of the 
two complained to a magistrate, that he had kept his 
foot shod decently, and "had shod the fourth foot 
twice to boot /" Let modern socialists take a few les- 
sons from these originals. 

Their materials for agricultural labor were at one 
time quite novel : when a field was to be harrowed the 
harrow was made fast to the pony's tail ; a rope was 
fastened to the horse's tail, and then to the harrow ; 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 87 

but if the hair of the tail was long it was fastened by a 
peg into a hole in the harrow ; thus equipped, a man 
mounted his back, and drove him over the field. Who- 
ever lacks invention let him learn from Paddy. The 
following true description of that district is given by 
Patrick M'Kye, the teacher of the National School, in 
1837, in a memorial sent to the Lord Lieutenant ; nor 
was Patrick's memorial in vain, for it not only awaken- 
ed an Englishman to send these naked ones clothing, 
but it will be handed down to future generations, as a 
memento of both the suffering state of that people, and 
the faithfulness of the writer ; and, above all, it will 
show in very lively colors what persevering enlightened 
philanthropy can do, when in the heart of such a land- 
lord as Lord George Hill. 

Here follows the document ; and if every school- 
master in Ireland had so turned his parish inside out, 
many more Lords, like George Hill, might have long 
since arisen to their help : — 

" To His Excellency the Lord- Lieutenant of Ireland, 



" Most Humbly Showeth, 

" That the parishioners of the parish of West Tul- 
laghobegly, in the Barony of Kilmacrennan, in the 
County of Donegal, are in the most needy, hungry, and 
naked condition of any people that ever came within the 
precincts of my knowledge, although I have traveled a 



88 ANNALS OF THE 

part of nine counties in Ireland, also a part of Eng- 
land and Scotland, together with a part of British 
America ; I have likewise perambulated 2253 miles 
through seven of the United States, and never 
witnessed the tenth part of such hunger, hardships and 
nakedness. 

" Now, my Lord, if the causes which I now lay be- 
fore your Excellency, were not of very extraordinary 
importance, I would never presume to lay them before 
you. 

" But I consider nryself in duty bound by charity to 
relieve distressed and hungry fellow-man, although 
I am sorry to state that my charity cannot extend 
farther than to explain to the rich where hunger and 
hardships exist, in almost the greatest degree that nature 
can endure. 

" This I shall endeavor to explain in detail, with all 
the truth and accuracy in my power, and without the 
least exaggeration, as follows : — 

" There are about 4000 * persons in this parish, and 



* This is an error ; the population of Tullaghobegly being 9049 in 
the year 1841. Paddy M'Kye, however, when he wrote in the year 
1837, had no means of ascertaining this, as he had all the other par- 
ticulars in his statement. 

This error of the faithful Paddy is certainly a very modest one, and 
serves rather to brighten than eclipse the picture. It looks as though 
the mind of the writer was not so perverted, nor so lacking in ma- 
terial, as to be driven to exaggeration to make out a vivid, exciting 
story. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 



89 



all Catholics, and as poor as I shall describe, having 
among them no more than — 



" One cart, 
No wheel car, 

No coach, or any other vehicle, 
One plow, 
Sixteen harrows, 
Eight saddles, 
Two pillions, 
Eleven bridles, 
Twenty shovels, 
Thirty-two rakes, 
Seven table-forks, 
Ninety-three chairs, 



One priest, 

No other resident gentleman, 

No bonnet, 

No clock, 

Three watches, 

Eight brass candlesticks, 

No looking glasses above 3d. iu 

price, 
No boots, no spurs, 
No fruit trees, 
No turnips, 
No parsnips, 



Two hundred and forty-three No carrots, 



stools, 
Ten iron grapes, 
No swine, hogs, or pigs, 
Twenty-seven geese, 
Three turkeys, 
Two feather beds, 
Eight chaff beds, 
Two stables, 
Six cow-houses, 
One national school, 
No other school, 



No clover. 

Or any other garden vegetables, 
but potatoes and cabbage, and 
not more than ten square feet 
of glass in windows in the 
whole, with the exception of 
the chapel, the school-house, 
the priest's house, Mr. Dom- 
brain's house, and the consta- 
bulary barrack. 



" None of their either married or unmarried women 
can afford more than one shift, and the fewest number 
can afford any, and more than one half of both men 
and women cannot afford shoes to their feet, nor can 
many of them afford a second bed, but whole families of 
sons and daughters of mature age indiscriminately lying 
together with their parents, and all in the bare buff. 

" They have no means of harrowing their land, but 
with meadow rakes. Their farms are so small that 



90 ANNALS OF THE 

from four to ten farms can be harrowed in a day with 
one rake. 

" Their beds are straw — green and dried rushes or 
mountain bent : their bed-clothes are either coarse 
sheets, or no sheets, and ragged filthy blankets. 

" And worse than all that I have mentioned, there is 
a general prospect of starvation, at the present prevail- 
ing among- them, and that originating from various 
causes, but the principal cause is the rot or failure of 
seed in the last year's crop, together with a scarcity of 
winter forage, in consequence of a long continuation of 
storm since October last, in this part of the country. 

" So that they, the people, were under the necessity 
of cutting down their potatoes and giving them to their 
cattle to keep them alive. All these circumstances con- 
nected together, have brought hunger to reign among 
them to that degree, that the generality of the peasantry 
are on the small allowance of one meal a day, and many 
families cannot afford more than one meal in two clays, 
and sometimes one meal in three clays. Their children 
are crying and fainting with hunger, and their parents 
weeping, being full of grief, hunger, debility and dejec- 
tion, with glooming aspect, looking at their children 
likely to expire in the jaws of starvation. 

" Also, in addition to all, their cattle and sheep are 
dying with hunger, and their owners forced by hunger 
to eat the flesh of such. 'Tis reasonable to suppose 
that the use of such flesh will raise some infectious dis- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 91 

ease among the people, and it may very reasonably be 
supposed, that the people will die even faster than the 
cattle and sheep, if some immediate relief be not sent 
to alleviate their hunger. 

" Now, my Lord, it may perhaps seem inconsistent 
with truth that all I have said could possibly be true, 
but to convince your noble Excellency of the truth of 
all that I have said, I will venture to challenge the 
world to produce one single person to contradict any 
part of my statement. 

" I must acknowledge, that if reference were made 
to any of the landlords or landholders of the parish, 
they would contradict it, as it is evident it would blast 
their honors if it were known abroad that such a degree 
of want existed in their estates among their tenantry. 
But here is how I make my reference and support the 
truth of all that I have said ; that is, if any unpre- 
judiced gentleman should be sent here to investigate 
strictly into the truth of it, I will, if called on, go with 
him from house to house, where his eyes will fully 
satisfy and convince him, and where I can show him 
about one hundred and forty children bare naked, and 
who were so during winter, and some hundreds only 
covered with filthy rags, most disgustful to look at. 
Also, man and beast housed together, i.e., the families 
in one end of the house, and the cattle in the other end 
of the kitchen. 

" Some houses have within their walls, from one cwt. 



92 ANNALS OF THE FAMINE. 

to thirty cwts. of dung, others having from ten to 
fifteen tons weight of dung, and only cleaned out once 
a year ! 

" I have also to add that the National School has 
greatly decreased in number of scholars, through hunger 
and extreme poverty ; and the teacher of said school, 
with a family of nine persons, depending on a salary of 
<£8 a year, without any benefit from any other source. 
If I may hyperbolically speak, it is an honor for the 
Board of Education ! 

" One remark before I conclude. I refer your noble 
Excellency for the authenticity of the above statement 

to the Rev. H. O'F , Parish Priest, and to Mr. 

R , Chief Constable, stationed at Gweedore, in 

said parish, and Mr. P , Chief Officer of Coast 

Guard, in same district. 

" Your most humble and obedient Servant, 

" Patrick M'Kye." 



CHAPTER IV. 



" I stand alone, without fear, in the midst of thousands, though 
the valiant be distant far." — Ossian. 



Now, reader, summon your forces, collect your 
strength, and see if you are prepared to meet such a 
formidable host and go forth to battle. There was one 
in the face and eyes of all the foregoing graphic facts, 
stood up single-handed ; and, like the shepherd son of 
Jesse, went forth and boldly challenged this gigantic 
Goliah. Yes ! Lord George Hill is not a George 
Washington, his work was a mightier one — his was a 
grapple with mind, with untutored mind, gathering 
strength for ages, till it seemed to defy all attempts of 
reform ; and, like the bold cliffs which hung over their 
wild coast, stood up in their pride and said, " Dash on, 
we heed you not." Washington had carnal battles to 
fight, and with carnal weapons, in the hands of gallant 
soldiers, he scattered the foe. But mark ! He that by 
moral power grapples with the worst passions of men, 
and lays them harmless at his feet, has done more than 
he who has conquered whole armies by the sword. This, 
Lord George Hill has done. In 1838 this indefatigable 
man purchased small holdings, adding to them, till the 
whole amounted to upward of 23,000 acres. 3,000 
people then inhabited the land, and but TOO paid rent. 



94 ANNALS OF THE 

What did he do ? Did he take a body of policemen, 
and arm himself with a pike and pistol, and go forth, 
demanding submission or death 1 He had an efficient 
agent ; and " temporary apartments were fitted up on 
the spot." He then went himself into every hut on 
his estate : and, understanding Irish, he soon gained 
access to their hearts : they said, " he could not be a 
lord because he spoke Irish." 

His first work was to check the illicit distillation of 
their grain ; and he built a corn store, 87 feet long and 
22 wide, with three lofts, and a kiln ; then a quay was 
formed in front of the store, admitting vessels of 200 
tons, having 14 feet of water at the height of the tide. 
A market was established, where the same price was 
paid for grain as at Letterkenny, 26 miles distant. 
The difficulties of building this store were great indeed 
— no masons or carpenters in the vicinity — and the site 
must be excavated by blasting a solid rock. But what 
will not, and what did not perseverance do 1 It was 
done, and next a wheelwright was employed ; timber 
and iron brought from Derry ; until the calls multipli- 
ed, the store was stocked with the common necessaries 
of life, and at last it was increased double in size. The 
inhabitants, for the first time, began to eat bread ; and, 
can you believe it 1 savage as they were, they loved it. 
The next difficult work was to place each tenant on his 
own farm ; and to do this every landholder was served 
with notice " to quit." A surveyor had drawn maps, 
the tenants were assembled, and, the new allotments 
made according to his rent, all previous bargains were 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 95 

adjusted to mutual satisfaction. But the final allot- 
ments of land took three years to settle : they must 
look over their new farms, all in one piece, and cast 
lots for them. The Rundale system, when disturbed, 
brought new difficulties to these people ; it broke up 
their clusters of huts, and the facilities of assembling 
nights, to tell and hear long stories ; and they must 
tumble down their cabins, which were of loose stones ; 
and the owner of the cabin hired a fiddler, which no 
sooner known, than the joyous Irish are on the spot : 
each takes a stone or stones upon his or her back, (for 
women and children are there,) — they dance at intervals 
— the fiddler animates them on while the day light lasts, 
and then the night is finished by dancing. When the 
houses were set up anew upon the farms, Lord George 
thought it advisable to have a few ten acre farms, 
fenced in on the waste land. This was instantly op- 
posed, for they did not want these divisions occupied, as 
by so doing it would thin out the crowds and break up 
the clanship too much. They would not be hired to 
make the ditches; and a "fearless wanderer" could 
only do the work ; though sods of turf were hurled at 
him he kept on, but the contest was so sharp that it 
was settled at last by two policemen, at night, who 
frightened away the assailants, who had assembled to 
" settle" the ditch. Peace was concluded, ditches were 
made, premiums were offered for the best specimens of 
clean cottages, which now had chimneys and windows, 
whitewashed walls, suitable beds and bedsteads, crock- 
ery and chairs, and the manure heap at a respectable 



96 ANNALS OF THE 

distance, and all bearing the appearance of comfort. 
These premiums extended to growing green crops, 
draining farms, good calves, pigs, colts, &c, and for 
webs of cloth, best knit stockings, firkins of butter, &c, 
&c. The premium day was the wonder of wonders ; 
for they were told that the noble-hearted Lord George 
was to dine with them, which the poor people could not 
believe, and were afraid to go in, till the surveyor as- 
sured them that it was true. This was the crowning 
of the whole, and puts forever at rest any doubts of the 
good sense of this well-balanced mind, which knew how 
to lay the foundation, set up the walls, and put on his 
seal to the topmost stone. Our Savior explained this 
principle emphatically, when rebuked for eating with 
publicans and sinners : " I came not to call the righte- 
ous," &c. Lord George Hill knew well the secret 
avenue to the hearts of these people ; he knew they 
were men, and though circumstances had made them 
degraded ones, yet if the smothered embers of that 
Image in which they were created could be stirred, liv- 
ing sparks would be emitted. Did this "familiarity 
breed contempt V Did they take undue advantage, and 
say, " We will not have this man to rule over us ;" 
and was God offended 1 Come and see the fruits of his 
decision and condescension — they both stand out in as 
bold relief as the old mountain Arrigle which nods its 
cloud-capped head over this district. 

But details must be left : Facts from Gweedore, 
should be in the hand and heart of every landlord who 
may have anything to do in difficulties like these. Let 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 97 

him visit these comfortable cottages, supplied with de- 
cencies, to cause the inmates to feel that they are hu- 
man ; let him see the industry of the women and the 
becoming clothing of the peasantry ; let him visit the 
store, the mill, the union-house, school-house, and dis- 
pensary ; and while he is doing all this, let his home be 
for a few days in that well-ordered hotel, and notice the 
consistency of the ;vhole ; and if he can, let him go and 
do likewise. If he cannot, let him retrace all his steps, 
and impartially decide how far his own negligence, im- 
providence, love of ease, and indifference to the real 
good of his tenantry, may have contributed to bring him 
into this state. If he have not capital, like Lord 
George Hill, where is his capital % Have horses, coach- 
es, hunting dogs, and hunting dinners frittered it away 1 
Then woe betide him, his day is over, who can help 
him 1 The school-house at Bunbeg, near this store, is 
not a small item in this great work. The room is 25 
feet by 15, lofty and well-ventilated. The teacher has 
a dwelling under the same roof ; and when I visited it 
all was order and comfort. The girls are taught sew- 
ing, for of this the people are quite ignorant, and it may 
safely be presumed that Lord George would not re- 
strict their advance in education to certain bounds, lest 
their talents should transcend their station in life. I 
spent a Sabbath in that quiet hotel, and attended the 
Church service, which was then conducted in the school- 
room ; a house of worship was in progress, but not ready 
to be opened. The female tenantry who were at home, 
walking upon the street, or calling into the hotel, al- 



98 ANNALS OF THE 

ways had their knitting-work in motion whenever I saw 
them, and such a surplus of stockings as amounted to 
about £200, was then on hand, all of which the females 
had been paid for knitting. " They shall not be idle," 
said his lordship, " though the work is on my hands un- 
sold." His family residence is located about twenty 
miles from Gweedore, but he and his wife were at the 
hotel the evening that I reached it, and meeting him in 
the morning in the hall — supposing him to be some re- 
spectable appendage to the house — made inquiries con- 
cerning it ; and not till he made some remarks respect- 
ing my self-denying travels in Ireland, did I find my 
mistake. I saw at once the secret of his mighty achieve- 
ments ; his simplicity was his dignity and strength. 
He had struggled hard during the famine to keep his 
tenantry from suffering, without much foreign aid, had 
sacrificed much, and difficulties were increasing. The 
next winter the hotel was closed for a time ; sickness 
had made inroads into the house, and death likewise ; 
but it was re-opened the next season, under more en- 
couraging auspices. 

This man has proved to a demonstration what can be 
done even with the most hopeless, and under the most 
discouraging circumstances ; for if Lord George Hill 
could transform those wild mountain goats, even to com- 
mon civilized bidlocks, what could not be done with any 
and all of the wild game of Ireland ? Pity, great pity, 
that so few have applied the right key to the Irish 
heart ! Still greater pity that so few believe there is a 
key that can find a right entrance ; give Lord George 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 99 

Hill a patent right, and let all who will improve it, and 
Ireland will arise. 

Now, in 1850, he writes, " Say that no person died 
of famine at Gweedore, though many of the aged and 
infants, from being scantily fed, died earlier than other- 
wise they would, as well as from change of diet ; also 
that the people are reviving in a great degree, from the 
potatoe having held out this year." 

Lord George Hill is an Irishman of the Hillsborough 
family, in the county Down, brother to the late and 
uncle to the present Marquis of Downshire, a true Irish- 
man, who lives and acts for his country. 

Two miles from Gweedore an English gentleman had 
fixed a residence on the woody side of a hill, with a fine 
lake at a little distance, who was attracted there by the 
beauty of the scenery, and a desire to enjoy the evening 
of his days in a romantic peaceful retirement among a 
peasantry which pleased him ; and his wife and daugh- 
ters were quite an acquisition to the scattered intelli- 
gent class, which dotted the wild scenery there. His 
family were then in England, and when I met him a 
few weeks after in Derry, he said, " I waited all day to 
see you, but when you come again we shall not be dis- 
appointed." He died a few weeks after, and left a sad 
breach in the hearts of many. 

This little incident is named to show how much the 
English, who go to Ireland because they admire the 
country, and justly appreciate the people, are beloved. 
They are always mentioned with the greatest admira- 



100 ANNALS OF THE 

tion where they have behaved with a proper condescen- 
sion and kindness to the people. 

My next excursion was from Gweedore to Dungloe, 
with Mr. Foster, who conducted me to his pretty cot- 
tage and lovely family, in the parish of Templecrone. 
It was a wild and dreary waste which led us to it — here 
and there a cluster of miserable cabins, and still more 
miserable inmates, met the eye ; now and then a hungry 
being would crawl out and make some sorrowful com- 
plaint of neglect by the relieving officer, which could 
not be remedied; but when we reached the cottage of 
my guide, all bespoke plenty and comfort. Here, in 
the midst of desolation and death, this isolated bright 
spot said, " Mercy is not clean gone forever." Here 
was the minister of Templecrone, who had come to 
dine, for he heard that a stranger who pitied Ireland 
was to be there, and his heart was made of tenderness 
and love. Seldom can be met a being where such ami- 
able, tender, and sympathetic kindness, are united with 
energy and perseverance, as were in this man. He was 
alive to every tale of woe, and active to surmount all 
difficulties ; with his own hands, he labored to assist the 
poor — they have laid their dead around his gate in the 
night, knowing that the " blessed minister would not 
let them be buried without a board on 'em." We 
spent a painful-pleasant evening at this hospitable 
house, talking of the dreadful scenes of death in their 
midst, and then the kind man rode eight miles on horse- 
back to his home. The next day we were to visit Ar- 
ranmore, a pretty sunny island, where peace and com- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 101 

fort had ever reigned. The peasantry here were about 
1500 in number, occupying a green spot three miles in 
length, and had always maintained a good character for 
morality and industry. They kept cows, which sup- 
plied them with milk, sheep with wool, geese with beds, 
fowls with eggs ; and grew oats, potatoes, and barley ; 
they wore shoes and stockings, which none of the female 
peasantry can do in the country places ; they likewise 
spun and made their own wearing apparel, and as the 
difficulty of crossing the channel of the sea, which was 
three miles, was considerable, they seldom visited the 
main land. When they saw the potatoe was gone, they 
ate their fowls, sheep, and cows, and then began to 
cross the sea to Templecrone for relief. What could 
they find there 1 One man could do but little to stay 
the desolation. Hundreds had died before this, and 
though I knew that painful scenes were in waiting, yet, 
if possible, the half was not told me. Six men, beside 
Mr. Griffith, crossed with me in an open boat, and we 
landed, not buoyantly, upon the once pretty island. 
The first that called my attention was the death-like 
stillness — nothing of life was seen or heard, excepting 
occasionally a dog. These looked so unlike all others 
I had seen among the poor I unwittingly said — " How 
can the dogs look so fat and shining here, where there 
is no food for the people V 9 " Shall I tell her V 9 said 
the pilot to Mr. Griffith, not supposing that I heard 
him. 

This was enough : if anything were wanting to make 
the horrors of a famine complete, this supplied the 



102 ANNALS OF THE 

deficiency. Reader, I leave you to your thoughts, and 
only add that the sleek dogs of Arranniore were my 
horror, if not my hatred, and have stamped on my mind 
images which can never be effaced. 

We made our first call at the door of the chapel ; the 
fat surly-looking priest was standing there ; and, saying 
to him, " Your people, sir, are in a bad state." " Bad 
enough, they give me nothing." " Why should they ? — 
you cannot expect or ask anything of the poor starving 
creatures." The curate withdrew, leaving the battle to 
be decided by the priest, pilot, and myself, for he had 
known him before. " Ah," said the pilot, softly, " he's 
a hard one ; there's the Christian for you," pointing to 
the curate, "he's the man that has the pitiful heart, — 
not a cratur on the island but would lay down the life 
for him.". This pilot was a Roman Catholic, but that 
characteristic impartiality, peculiar to the Irish, where 
justice and mercy are concerned, belonged to him like- 
wise. We went from cabin to cabin, till I begged the 
curate to show me no more. Not in a solitary instance 
did one beg. When we entered their dark, smoky, floor- 
less abodes, made darker by the glaring of a bright sun, 
which had been shining upon us, they stood up before 
us in a speechless, vacant, staring, stupid, yet most 
eloquent posture, mutely graphically saying, " Here we 
are, your bone and your flesh, made in God's image, like 
you. Look at us ! What brought us here V May God 
forgive me, and I believe he will, or T would not say it. 
With Job, I said, " Let darkness and the shadow of 
deatli stain that day when first the potato was planted 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 103 

in this green isle of the sea, to oppress the poor laborer, 
and at last bring him to a valley of death — deep, dark, 
intricate — -where slimy serpents, poison lizards, and 
gnawing vultures creep and wind about his wasted limbs, 
and gnaw into the deepest recesses of his vitals. 

In every cabin we visited, some were so weak that 
they could neither stand nor sit, and when we entered 
they saluted us, by crawling on all fours toward us, and 
trying to give some token of welcome. Never, never 
was the ruling passion stronger in death. That heart- 
felt greeting which they give the stranger, had not in 
the least died within them ; it was not asking charity, 
for the curate answered my inquiries afterward, con- 
cerning the self-control, which was the wonder of all, 
that he had sent a man previously through the island, 
to say that a stranger, from across the sea, was coming 
to visit them, but she had no money or food to give, and 
they must not trouble her. I gave a little boy a biscuit, 
and a thousand times since have I wished that it had 
been thrown into the sea ; it could not save him : he took 
it between his bony hands, clasped it tight, and half-bent 
as he was, lifted them up, looked with his glaring eyes 
upon me, and gave a laughing grin that was truly hor- 
rible. The curate turned aside, and beckoned me away. 
"Did you see that horrid attempt to laugh?" "I 
cannot stay longer," was my answer. We hurried away. 
The noble-minded pilot said, " Will you step into my 
little place, and I will show you the boiler where I made 
the soup and stirabout, while the grants lasted." These 
grants were mostly sent by the churches in England, 



104 ANNALS OF THE 

and some poor deserving persons selected to give them 
out, and a very small compensation granted them, from 
the food they were distributing ; and it should be here 
remarked, that when mention is made of the difference 
between " hirelings " and "volunteers," I mean those 
u hirelings " who were paid by government great sala- 
ries, and like the slave-overseers, could order this Hog- 
ging, and withhold that, according to their own caprices. 
This does not in the least apply to such distributors as 
these. 

The house of this man was a step in advance of the 
common cabins, and every part as clean as cabin or cot- 
tage could be ; his young despairing wife sat, with a 
clean cap and apron on, for she knew we were coming, 
and uncomplainingly answered our inquiries respecting 
food, that they had not eaten that day, and the husband 
led us into the next room, opened a chest, took out a small 
bowl, partly filled with some kind of meal, and solemnly 
declared that they had not another morsel in the cabin 
or out, nor a sixpence to buy any. The curate said, 
" I know him well, he is a deserving man, and tells us 
the truth." 

When we left this cabin we passed a contiguous one, 
and a decently clad woman, with shoes and stockings, 
and blue petticoat, (that was the kind the peasants al- 
ways wore in their days of comfort,) very pleasantly of- 
fered me a bowl of milk. Astonished at the sight of 
such a luxury, I refused, from the principle that it 
would be robbing the starving. " I regret," said the 
curate, as we turned away, " that you did not take it, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 105 

her feelings were deeply injured : a shadow of disap- 
pointment," he said, " came over her face, as she an- 
swered in Irish : c The stranger looks wairy and her 
heart is drooping for the nourishment. 5 " O, my 
Heavenly Father ! my " heart drooping for nourish- 
ment" after having taken a wholesome breakfast, and 
with the prospect of a good dinner at our return. A 
second kind woman was about making the same offer- 
ing, when I begged Mr. Griffith, who spoke Irish, to 
say how much I thanked her ; but that I never drank 
milk, and was not in the least hungry. Inquiring how 
we came to find milk, the pilot answered, that scattered 
here and there, a comfortable farmer, who had milked 
some three or four cows, had saved one from the wreck ; 
but that would soon go, and then all must die together. 
We hurried away. And now for the burying-ground. 
" You have seen the living, and must now see the place 
of the dead." 

A famine burying-ground on the sea-coast has some 
peculiarities belonging to itself. First, it often lies on 
the borders of the sea, without any wall, and the dead 
are put into the earth without a coffin, so many piles on 
piles that the top one often can be seen through the 
thin covering; loose stones are placed over, but the 
dogs can easily put these aside, and tear away the loose 
dirt. This burial-place was on a cliff, whose sides were 
covered with rough stones, and the ascent in some parts 
very difficult. We ascended, sometimes keeping erect, 
and sometimes being obliged to stoop and use our hands. 
When we reached the top, the painful novelty repaid all 
5* 



106 ANNALS OF THE 

our labor. It was an uneven surface of a few perches, 
with new-made graves and loose stones covering them. 
A straw-rope was lying near a fresh-dug grave, which 
the pilot said belonged to an old man, who two days 
before he saw climbing the cliff, with a son of fifteen 
lashed to his back by that cord, bringing in his feeble 
hand a spade. " I untied, the cord, took the corpse 
from the father's back, and with the spade, as well as I 
could, made a grave and put in the boy ;" adding, 
" Here you see so many have been buried, that I could 
not cover him well." 

This was the burial-place of Arranmore, and here, 
at the foot, was the old roaring ocean, dashing its proud 
waves, embracing in its broad arms this trembling green 
gem, while the spray was continually sprinkling its salt 
tears upon its once fair cheek, as if weeping over a de- 
solation that it could not repair. At a little distance 
was a smooth green field, rearing its pretty crop of 
young barley, whose heads were full and fast ripening 
for the sickle. " This," said Mr. Griffith, " is the 
growth of seed which was presented by William Bennet, 
last March ; the poor creatures have sowed it, and if 
the hands that planted it live to reap the crop, they 
will have a little bread. Take a few heads of it, and 
send them to him as a specimen of its fine growth, and 
of their care in cultivating it. Had these industri- 
ous people," he added, ;i been supplied in the spring 
with seed of barley and turnips, they would not need 
charity from the public. The government sent a sup- 
ply around the coast, the delighted people looked up 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 107 

with hope, when, to their sad disappointment, this ex- 
pected gift was offered at a price considerably higher 
than the market one, and we saw the ships sailing 
away, without leaving its contents 5 for not one was 
able to purchase a pound. And we have since been 
told, that the ' lazy dogs ' were offered seed, but refus- 
ed, not willing to take the trouble to sow it." 

We left without doing one favor, and without being 
asked to do one, except to drink a basin of milk. We 
found two little meagre, almost naked girls, sitting upon 
the beach picking shells and grinding them in their 
clean teeth ; they gave a vacant look as we spoke, but 
answered not. 

I gave the six boatmen a shilling each, who had not 
eaten one mouthful that day, and Mr. G. added six- 
pence each. Their grateful acknowledgments were 
doubly affecting, when they said, " This is more than 
we have had at one time since the famine," and they 
hastened to the meal-shop to purchase a little for their 
starving families. We went to a full dinner, prepared 
in that style which the gentry of Ireland are accustom- 
ed to prepare for guests ; but what was food to me 1 
The sights at Arranmore were food sufficient. What 
could be done 1 Mrs. Forster said, she had written to 
England, till she was ashamed to tire their generosity 
again ; not once had she been refused from the church- 
es there, and she felt that their patience must be ex- 
hausted. She gave the names of some of her donors. 
A letter was written in the desperation of feeling to an 
Independent minister there ; and God forever bless 



108 ANNALS OF* THE 

him and his people, for the ready response. Arran- 
more was relieved a little. 

The next da}', a ride of eight miles took me to the 
house of Mr. Griffith ; and here was a family made up 
of that kindness which the husband and father possess- 
ed. He occupied a spot among the honest poor indeed. 
We went over the bleak waste, to visit a romantic pile 
of cliff, upon the sea-coast, and on our way the laugh- 
ing sport of children suddenly broke upon the ear, the 
first I had heard since the famine ; it was from behind 
a little hillock, and the sound was mournfully pleasant. 
We hurried on to greet the joyous ones ; and, unper- 
ceived, saw two little ragged girls, not wasted entirely 
by hunger, who had come out of a little dark cluster of 
stone cabins, and forgetting their sufferings, were play- 
ing as other children play. We saluted them, and told 
them to "play on, we are glad to see your sports." 
We spoke of the allusion of the prophet, when boys and 
girls are again " to be seen playing in the streets of 
Jerusalem," as a token of its happiness — a happiness 
which, until the famine of Ireland, I never valued 
enough, but now it is one of the brightest sunbeams 
that shine across my path. We at last reached one of 
the most fearful, sublime, and dangerous broken piles of 
rocks imaginable, tumbled together, and standing al- 
most perpendicularly over the ocean. Deep and fright- 
ful caverns yawned between them, and how they came 
tumbled in this mass never has been made out ; they 
appeared as if shaken together by some sudden crash, 
and stopped while in their wildest confusion, each seiz- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 109 

ing hold of its contiguous one to save it from falling. I 
was glad, quite glad to get away, for had my foot 
stumbled or slipped, some dark deep gulf might have 
placed me bevond help or hope. Ossian might have 
made his bed among these caves, when he says — 

" As two dark streams from high, rocks meet and mix." 

Rain hurried us to our dinner, and poured upon us, 
during the ride of eight miles, in darkness, to the cot- 
tage of Dungloe. A little incident occurred this even- 
ing, which happily testified to a remark made by Mr. 
Forster, in a letter to a committee, during the famine. 
Speaking of the starving poor, he says, " They are suf- 
fering most patiently, and in this parish, where there 
are ten thousand souls, not one single outrage has ever 
been committed in the memory of man." 

Mrs. Forster and myself in our retreat and hurry had 
neglected to shut the hall door ; m the mornmg it was 
quite open and the hall floor covered with water. 
" What a dangerous condition," I said, " is this", to 
leave a house at night,~~especially in a time of hunger, 
as the present." " Not in the least," was the answer ; 
" I should not be afraid to leave every door unlocked 
at night, and every window open, with food or any 
other property in reach ; not the least iota would be 
touched by one of them." This was self-discipline, 
which can scarcely be reconciled with hunger in any 
stomachs but the Irish. 

A letter from Mrs. Griffith, in the spring of 1849, 
says, that the people of Arranmore had recovered their 



110 ANNALS OF THE 

former standing, that relief was immediately sent from 
England, and they had saved as much for seed as they 
could, and not starve. Five hundred died from famine 
on that island. The potatoe was not blasted the fol- 
lowing year, and they again looked up with tolerable 
comfort. The island has since been sold, and cultiva- 
tion will be carried on upon a more extensive and pro- 
fitable scale. Could a new race of landlords settle up- 
on that coast, and drain and plow the now useless soil, 
the tenants that are drooping and discouraged, would 
lift up their heads with joy and hope. The air blows 
as pure as ever breezes did ; and were industry encour- 
aged, and food abundant, the inhabitants would cause 
the grave-digger to have the same source of complaint 
that once was made in the South, when a poor woman 
exclaimed, " The times are dreadful, ma'am, Patrick 
has not put a spade to the ground this six weeks, not a 
word of lyin." 

The comfort and hospitality at Roshine Lodge must 
be left, and with the kind Mrs. F. and her friend I 
turned away sadly from the scenes of desolation there 
witnessed, and again went to Gweedore, to meet Mrs. 
Hewitson, who was to accompany me to Belfast, and 
we prepared for the journey. She had distributed her 
grants, and her unceasing labors, often for twenty hours 
in twenty-four, called for relaxation. We left the 
pretty spot in sadness, for the starving were crowding 
about and pressing her for food, following the carriage 
— begging and thanking — blessing and weeping. We 
were obliged to shake them off, and hurried in agony 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. Ill 

away. " Many of these poor creatures," she observed, 
u will be dead on my return." On our way we passed 
the afternoon and night at Derry ; it was a day for a 
flower and cattle show. Here were attracted most of 
the gentry in the county, as well as nobility ; and we 
had an opportunity of sitting on a seat upon the sloping 
side of a hill, for nearly three hours, in a public garden, 
which overlooks a pretty part of the town, and feasting 
our eyes with a view of it. It was supposed nearly 
three thousand ladies had come out in their best, on 
this pleasant day, to see this pretty show of flowers ; 
and though these were almost surpassingly beautiful, 
as Ireland's flowers are, yet the ladies were more so. 
Their pretty figures, (for they are in general of a fine 
form,) and becoming dresses, in all the variety of 
modern colors and fashions, brought me, after more than 
two hours' admiration, to the conclusion that a more 
beautiful assemblage of females, of the like number, 
could not be found. Had the women been educated 
after the model of Solomon and Paul's " virtuous wo- 
men and housekeepers," what a crown of glory would 
they be l . But alas ! The most of the fine material 
of which woman is composed, is made up for ornament 
rather than use, in that unhappy country. A few Mrs. 
Hewitsons and Forsters are sprinkled here and there, 
and many can be found in Belfast who have arisen to a 
higher standard in this respect than the country in gene- 
ral ; and the famine, which has been the proof of all 
that is praiseworthy and all that is deficient in females, 
has shown that Belfast has a capital, which when em- 



112 ANNALS OF THE 

ployed can be worked to a great and good advantage. 
But their late rising and late breakfasts wasted the best 
part of the clay ; and their foolish custom, which made 
it approach to vulgarity to give a call before twelve, re- 
tarded much that might have been done more easily and 
effectually. It is much to be scrupled whether one 
arose " while it was yet dark, to prepare meat for her 
maidens." 

I spent a day in the Library, which was instituted in 
1788, and now contains 8,000 volumes, without one of 
fiction. Is there another library on the globe that can 
say this 1 It speaks more for the good sense and cor- 
rectness of principle in the people of Belfast than any 
comments or praise whatever can do. I felt, while sit- 
ting there, that here was an atmosphere of truth, entirely 
new. What would the reading community of all na- 
tions be, if youth had access to such libraries as these, 
and to no others ? 

From Belfast I went up the coast of Antrim, visited 
many beautiful towns and places, but all was saddened 
by the desolations of the famine. Industrial schools 
were everywhere showing their happy effects ; and often 
by the wayside, in clusters upon a bank, or under a" 
tree in some village, were young girls with their fancy 
knitting, sitting pleasantly together, busy at their work ; 
and this was a striking fact, that in no case, where they 
were thus employed, did they look untidy ; though their 
garments were of the plainest and poorest, 3^et they ap- 
peared cleanly. I visited a school at Larne, of this 
description, conducted by a pious widow woman ; and 



F\MINE IN IRELAND. 113 

the arrangements, in all respects, reflected honor on the 
superintendents and teacher. Their reading, writing, 
working, and knowledge of the scriptures, manifested 
great wisdom and faithfulness in the teacher, as well as 
aptness in the scholars. The most useful work was 
done there, and the finest fancy material, much of which 
has been sold in London, at a fair price, for the benefit 
of the poor children. One little girl of twelve, by her 
industry in that school, the preceding winter, had kept 
a family of three or four from the poor-house by her 
fancy knitting, occasionally working nearly all night. 
The father came to the window with a load of turf, to 
thank her for the instruction of the child, which had fed 
them through the winter, and this small token of his 
gratitude, humble as it was, he hoped she would not re- 
fuse. These schools, scattered through the island, in 
the midst of the desolating famine, looked, to the travel- 
er, like some humble violet or flower, springing in the 
desert or prairie, where a scathing fire had swept over 
the plain, and withered all that was most prominent to 
the beholder. Never did I see a company of these lit- 
tle ones, at their cheerful work, or have one present me 
with a specimen of her attainments, but the unassuming 
hope-cheered look, eloquently said, " Will you let us 
live % Will you give us our honest bread, for the will- 
ing labor of our hands, and allow us a dwelling-place 
among the nations of the earth V Here in these pret- 
ty towns, along the coast of Antrim, had the poor-laws 
manifested their handy-work. The advice of Daniel 
O'Connell concerning them, was, " If you begin to 



114 ANNALS OF THE 

build poorhouses, you had better at once make one grand 
roof over the whole island, for in due time the whole 
country will need a shelter under it." This precaution 
was not altogether a random one, for already had many 
of the industrious respectable tradesmen and widows, 
who were keeping lodging-houses, been compelled to 
give up their business — the taxes had come in and taken 
all within doors, which would sell at auction, for the 
poor-rates. I was directed to a respectable house to 
procure lodgings for a few days ; the disheartened 
widow said, " Two days ago I could have given you a 
well-furnished bedroom and parlor, but now I have nei- 
ther table, chair, or carpet on the floors ; the money 
was demanded for a new tax just levied, I could not 
raise it, my furniture was taken, and I have no means 
to fetch it back, or to get bread." She could not ex- 
pect respectable lodgers to stop with her, and saw no- 
thing but hunger or the poorhouse for herself and 
children. Telling her if she would give me a place to 
lie down, I would stop, and give the usual price, she 
gladly accepted it, and the money paid her for this was 
all the means she had to get one meal for herself and 
three children, while I was in the house. This was a 
person of good reputation, kept a tidy, well-furnished 
lodging-house ; and before the extra taxes had been 
laid on, had been able to put by a little money, but it 
had all been demanded the past year, and the means 
taken away to procure any more. This was the condi- 
tion of the entire country. 

While riding upon the car, the driver pointed to a 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 115 

peculiar dwelling, with a sign for refreshment, saying, 
" The woman here is a lucky one, for she pays no rent ; 
if you wish I will stop and let you go in." The entrance 
was through a door, into a cave, which narrowed as it 
extended back, till it came to a point, and was very 
much in the shape of a harrow. A person could stand 
upright at the mouth, but must stoop, and then crawl, 
if he proceeded. The old woman lit up her torch, and 
crept on, insisting that I should follow. The passage 
was so long, dark, and narrow, that paying the old wo- 
man her expected sixpence, I got excused. She had an 
old bed, lying by the side of one wall of the cave, a lit- 
tle table on the other, on which she kept cakes and 
" the drap of whisky," for the traveler ; and she told 
us merrily, that no landlord had disturbed her, and she 
had got the comfortable " bit " for many a twelve- 
month. Happy old woman ! It is hoped that when 
her gray hairs shall be removed to a still darker cave, 
the inheritance will fall to some other houseless 
head, who, like her, shall enjoy unmolested and unen- 
vied this happy den, which like comfort few of the poor 
outcasts of Ireland can ever hope to attain. Some of 
the most romantic spots are scattered upon this coast, 
which is for many a mile enlivened by white rocks, and 
small white pebbles, near the sea, so that the whole is 
so inviting, taking sea, rocks, beautiful road, and in 
many places backed by the rich woodland, that I left 
the carriage, and loitered among the varying beauties of 
running brooks, murmuring cascades, neat cottages and 
pretty churches, and deep green glens. My imagina- 



116 ANNALS OF THE 

tion was inclining to drink in the spirit of the simple 
little boy who accompanied me. When looking down 
from an eminence, on the path where we were walking, 
I saw a crumbling stone cabin, deep below me, in so 
narrow a defile that its opposite walls nearly extended 
to the perpendicular hills on each side ; and inquiring 
of the child who could ever build there, expecting to 
live in it, he simply replied, " Oh, lady ! that is a 
fairy's house ; the people have put on the roof many a 
time, but at night the fairies come and take it off. 
They live in this glen, ma'am." " Then the fairies do 
not like roofs to their houses 1" "I 'spose not, 
ma'am." 

These fairies have doubtless saved many an agent or 
tithe-gatherer a "good baitin'," whose cowardly con- 
science has come by night to rob some corn or hay-stack 
for his unjust gain. Leaving my little companion, I 
ascended higher and higher, till at my feet far away 
stretched the broad sea ; and about were sprinkled 
cabins, looking like the "shabby gentility," which a de- 
cayed person who had fallen from higher life keeps up. 
I entered one of cleanly appearance, and stumbled up- 
on a most frightful sight. A woman with a child on 
her lap gave me an indifferent nod of welcome, and 
pointed to a bed through the door ; supposing some 
starving object lay there, I turned to look, and on a bed 
lay her husband, his face uncovered, swollen and black, 
entirely blind, and blood still fresh about his hair and 
pillow, and he speechless. She was alone with him, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 117 

her infant the only inmate : the doctor had just left 
without dressing his face. 

The story was, two hours before, going to his labor, a 
furious bull had broken from his fastenings and was in 
mad pursuit after a lady, whose screams attracted the 
poor laborer ; he ran with his spade, rushed between 
the horns of the animal and the lady, but could not save 
himself from the bull, which trampled him in the dirt, 
gored his face, broke his upper jaw, and tore apart one 
nostril. Three of the animal's legs were tied with the 
rope when he accomplished all this. The story ended 
by — " Thank God, the lady was saved, and the mad 
bull shot by the owner," and not one word of complaint 
about her husband. When I said, " What a pity that 
he went near him." u But, ma'am, didn't he go to save 
the lady, and wouldn't she been kilt if he hadn't done 
it?" So much for being a lady in Ireland, and for Irish 
courage and humanity. Returning to Belfast, I pre- 
pared for Dublin, and again sought out old Cook 
Street ; some of my pensioners had removed, but none 
dead : their rent had been left to be paid weekly for 
them, and sufficient knitting given for their employ. 
Another grant was coming for me, to be deposited at 
Belfast, and the expense of transportation to Dublin 
would be such, that it was placed in the trustworthy 
hands of Mrs. Hewitson, who could get it conveyed to 
her destitute people at a smaller expense, when she 
should return. This donation, she afterwards said, 
was eked out for months at the most sparing rate ; and 
the only relief she had in her power during the follow- 



118 ANNALS OF THE 

ing winter season. A box of clothing was in my pos- 
session, and with this and a little money, I resolved to 
go to the western coast, m Connaught. I went, and 
Connaught will long live in my memory, for there are 
still scenes of sufferings of cruelty, and of patience, 
which no other people yet have shown to the world. 
That people who from the time of the invasion have 
been " hunted and peeled," treated as the " offscour- 
ing of all things," driven into " dens and caves of the 
earth," as the only shelter, now still live, to hold out to 
the world that lineament of the " image of God," which 
is, and which must be the everlasting rebuke of their 
persecutors ; which says in the face and eyes of all 
mankind, to their spoilers — " You have hated me, you 
have robbed me, you have shorn me of my beauty ; and 
now, while famine is eating up my strength, gnawing 
my vitals, you are turning me into the storm, without 
food, or even " sheep-skins or goat-skins " for a cover- 
ing ; and then tauntingly saying, " Wherein have we 
robbed you ?" 

I took the train at Dublin, for twenty -five miles, then 
a coach to Tuam, where I tarried one night. This is the 
residence of Bishop M'Hale, and a somewhat respecta- 
ble old town ; but the picture of sorrow was here too, 
and the next morning I gladly proceeded to Newport. 
It rained hard, we were on an open car, and the 
wretchedness of the country made it altogether a dismal 
ride. When we had reached a few miles of the town, 
a dissipated, tattered, and repulsive looking man was 
seated before me on the car, which was not a little an- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 119 

noying, for he might be a little intoxicated. " Has he 
paid his fare," I asked the coachman, knowing that if 
he had, he had the same right as I had ; and still more, 
it would confirm me in the opinion that if he had money 
to pay his ride, he might have money for drink. We 
went on, my unpleasant companion never once speaking, 
till we reached our stopping-place, the Post-Office, at 
Newport. Here, at my old tried friend's, Mrs. Arthur, 
I met with a cordial welcome, and getting from the car, 
was still more annoyed to see this out-of-the-way com- 
panion reach the door before me, and fall prostrate in 
the passage ; this was certainly proof that he had been 
taking whisky, for he did not look like one in the last 
stages of starvation. My severity upon myself was 
equal to my surprise, when we found that it was ex- 
haustion occasioned by hunger. When he could speak 
in a whisper, he begged Mrs. Arthur to take a few 
sovereigns, which he had sewed up in his ragged coat, 
and send them to his wife and children, who were suf- 
fering for food. He had been at work in England, and 
knowing the dreadful state his family were in at home, 
had saved the few sovereigns, not willing to break one, 
and endeavored to reach home on a few shillings he had, 
and being so weak for want of food, he occasionally rode 
a few miles when it rained, and had not eaten once in 
two days. " Send them quick," he said, "I shall not 
live to reach home." O, shame / shame ! on my 
wicked suspicions ; how should I be thus deceived ! I 
could not, I would not forgive myself. His story was 



120 ANNALS OF THE 

a true one, and by proper care he lived to follow his 
sovereigns home. 

The astonishing suffering and self-denial of that peo- 
ple for their friends, is almost heart-rending. It is ex- 
jwcted that mothers will suffer, and even die for their 
famishing little ones, if needful ; but to see children 
suffer for one another was magnanimity above all. Two 
little orphan boys, one about nine and the other five, 
called at the door of a rich widow of my acquaintance, 
and asked for food. The woman had consumed all her 
bread at breakfast but a small piece, and giving this to 
the eldest, she said, " You must divide this with your 
little brother; I have no more." She looked after 
them unperceived, and saw them stop, when the eldest 
said, " Here, Johnny, you are littler than I, and can- 
not bear the hunger so well, and you shall have it all." 
They were both houseless orphans and starving with 
hunger. 

I found here, at Newport, misery without a mask ; 
the door and window of the kind Mrs. Arthur wore a 
spectacle of distress indescribable ; naked, cold, and 
dying, standing like petrified statues at the window, or 
imploring, for God's sake, a little food, till I almost 
wished that I might flee into the wilderness, far, far 
from the abode of any living creature. 

Mrs. Arthur said, " I have one case to place before 
you, and will leave all the rest to your own discretion. 
I have fed a little boy, once a day, whose parents and 
brothers and sisters are dead, with the exception of one 
little sister. The boy is seven years old, the sister five. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 121 

They were told they must make application to the poor- 
house, at Castlebar, which was ten Irish miles away. 
One cold rainy day in November, this boy took his little 
sister by the hand, and faint with hunger, set off for 
Castlebar. And now, reader, if you will, follow these 
little bare-footed^ bare-headed Connaught orphans 
through a muddy road of ten miles, in a rainy day, 
without food, and see them at the workhouse, late at 
night. The doors are closed — at last, they succeed in 
being heard. The girl is received, the boy sent away — 
no room for him — he made his way back to Newport the 
next morning, and had lived by crawling into any place 
he could at night, and once a day called at the door of 
my friend who fed him. 

He soon came a fine-looking boy, with unusually ma- 
tured judgment. The servant was paid for taking him 
into an outhouse and scrubbing him thoroughly, &c. A 
nice black suit of clothes was found in the American 
box, with a cap suited to his head ; and when he was 
suitably prepared by the servant, the clothes were put 
on. He had not, probably, been washed for six months, 
and his clothes were indescribable ; his skin, which had 
been kept from wind and sun, by the coat which had so 
long been gathering, was white, and so changed was he 
wholly and entirely, that I paused to look at him ; and 
tied about his neck a pretty silk handkerchief, to finish 
the whole. " What do you say now, my boy ; I shall 
burn your old clothes, and you never shall see them 
again?" A moment's hesitation — he looked up, I sup- 
posed to thank me, when to my surprise, he burst into 
6 



122 ANNALS OF THE 

an agony of loud weeping. " What can be the mat- 
ter V 9 He answered, " Now I shall sure die with the 
hunger ; if" they see me with nice clothes on, they will 
say I tell lies, that I have a mother that minds me ; and 
lady, you won't burn them old clothes," (turning about 
to gather them up) ; and if I had not sternly command- 
ed him to drop them, he would have clasped them close, 
as his best and dearest friends. In truth, this was a 
new development of mind I had never seen before, 
clinging with a firm grasp to a bundle of filthy, forbid- 
ding garments, as the only craft by which to save his 
life ; choosing uncleanliness to decency, at an age too 
when all the young emotions of pride generally spring 
up in fondness for new and pretty garments. The silk 
handkerchief seemed almost to frighten him. Was it 
the principle of association, which older people experi- 
ence when they cling to objects which have been their 
companions in trial, or those places where they have 
seen their dearest comforts depart ? He would not have 
consented to have left those old clothes behind, but by 
a promise which he could hardly believe ; that he should 
be fed every day through the winter. He was taken 
immediately to a school, where the children were fed 
once a day, and instructed for a penny a week ; this 
penny, the teacher said, should not be exacted, as he 
had been clothed by me. I saw the boy through the 
winter, three months after his clothes were tidy and had 
not been torn, and he was improving. 

His fears respecting the " hungry " were not ground- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 123 

less, no stranger would have believed that he needed 
charity, when decently clad. 

From Newport I went to Achill Sound. Here was 
enough to excite the pity and energy of all such as pos- 
sessed them. This wild dreary sea-coast at any time 
presents little except its salubrity of air, and grandeur 
of storms and tempests, tempered with the beauty of its 
varied clouds, when lighted by the sun, to make it the 
most inviting spot. But now the work of death was 
going on ; and, notwithstanding the exertions of Mr. 
Savage, with the aid of the Central Committee in Dub- 
lin, and government relief beside, at times it seemed to 
mock all effort. Mr. Savage seemed to be in the po- 
sition of the "ass colt" in scripture, "tied where 
two ways meet." He had the island of Achill on one 
side across the Sound, and a vast bog and mountainous 
waste on the other, with scarcely an inhabitant for 
many a mile, (but the colony of Mr. Nangle,) which 
could subsist only but by charity. The groups which 
surrounded the house, from the dawn of day till dark, 
called forth the incessant labors of many hands, both 
male and female, to appease the pitiful requests multi- 
plying around them. Oh ! the scenes of that dreadful 
winter ! Who shall depict them, and who that saw 
them can ever forget ? I have looked out at the door 
of that house, and seen from three to five, six, and se- 
ven hundred hovering about the windows and in the 
corners, not one woman or child having a shoe upon 
their feet, or a covering upon the head, with ghastly, 
yes, ghostly countenances of hunger and despair, that 



124 ANNALS OF THE 

mock all description. One fact among the many is re- 
corded, which transpired a few weeks before related to 
me by Mrs. Savage, which had novelties peculiar to it- 
self:— 

ABRAHAM AND SARA. 

Mrs. Savage saw standing at her door, among the 
crowd, while the relief was giving out, a feeble old wo- 
man, bare-footed, and her feet and legs swollen so that 
they assumed a transparency, which always indicated 
that death had begun its fatal ravages. She was near- 
ly a hundred years of age ; her becoming bearing and 
cleanly appearance, united with her age, caused Mrs. 
S. to inquire particularly who she was. 

" Why are you here — do you belong in this parish ! 
You are a stranger!" "I am, in troth, a stranger. 
My name is Sara, and I have now come into the parish 
to stop, in a little cabin, convenient to ye, and sure ye 
won't refuse the poor owld body a bit of the relief." 

Abraham, her husband, was sitting upon a form, 
among the crowd, waiting an answer to Sara's request. 

They were fed, but Sara could not be restored. She 
often called, on days when the relief was not given out, 
and was once told that she was troublesome ; she ac- 
knowledged it in the most simple manner, and in a few 
days ceased coming. 

Not long after Abraham called to say that Sara was 
ill, and had been obliged to leave the cabin where she 
had been stopping, and he had made her a shelter under 
a bank, in the bog, by the strand. She was no longer 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 125 

able to walk about, and daily Abraham brought a little 
saucepan, suspended by a cord for a handle, to get the 
broth, which Mrs. S. provided for his beloved Sara. 
He said he " had made her as comfortable as his owld 
hands could, but the breath would soon be cowld in her, 
for she could scarcely lift the hand to raise the broth to 
the lip." This bed was made in the bog, within a few 
yards of the sea, but sheltered from its spray by a bank, 
under which a narrow place had been dug by Abraham, 
which partly covered Sara. Heath was put down for 
her bed, and pieces of turf for her pillow ; a wall of 
turf a few inches high extended round, making the shape 
of a bed, against the side of which was a fire of turf, 
made to warm the broth ; and this was Abraham and 
Sara's house. Abraham's part was wholly unsheltered. 
For days she was nursed in the most careful manner ; 
her cloak was wrapped snugly about her ; the heath 
under her was smoothed, and her broth carried by Abra- 
ham ; and he even washed her garments in the sea, 
" for Sara," he said, " loves to be clean." In spite of 
all his care the life of Sara was fast ebbing ; and Mary 
A. ? who had seen before the bed where she lay, called 
one evening and found her much altered. She raised 
her up, gave her a little milk, which she could scarcely 
swallow. " I am departing," she whispered, " and 
will ye give my blessin' to the mistress V She had 
come into the parish, she said, to die, because " she 
knew the mistress would put a coffin on her owld body." 
While Mary was here, Abraham hastened to Mrs. S. 
to procure some necessaries for the night ; then return- 



126 ANNALS OF THE 

ing, he sat by the side of Sara till she died. He was 
sitting alone, by her lifeless body, when Mary returned 
in the morning. The mistress was soon there. She 
had ordered a coffin, and brought a sheet to wrap around 
her body, and a handkerchief to put about her head. 
Mary washed and combed her, and found in her pocket 
a piece of white soap, carefully wrapped in a linen rag, 
and a clean comb, which were all that appertained to 
Sara of this world's wealth, except the miserable gar- 
ments she had upon her. When the body was shroud- 
ed, it was placed in her coffin of white boards ; a boat- 
man and Mary lifted her into a boat ; Abraham and 
the mistress seated themselves in it, and were rowed to 
land, and put the remains of Sara in an out-house be- 
longing to Mr. Savage, for the night, and a comfortable 
place was provided for Abraham to lie down. Early in 
the morning Abraham was found sitting on the cart, 
which bore Sara from the boat, with his gray head lean- 
ing against the locked door, weeping. He had waited 
till all was still, and then crept to the spot which in- 
closed the remains of her he loved, to weep alone, in 
the stillness of night. Not one that saw him but 
wept too. 

This simple-hearted man, like the patriarch whose 
name he bore, was a stranger and sojourner, like him 
he had come to mourn for Sara, and he had come too to 
ask a burial-place for his dead, though he could not, 
like him, offer a sum of money ; he could not take his 
choice in the sepulchres ; no field of Ephron, nor the 
trees within were made sure to him, but in a lone bog, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 127 

where those who had died by famine and pestilence were 
buried, like dogs, unshrouded and uncoffined, he was 
grateful to find a place to bury his " dead out of his 
sight." The corpse was borne away by a few boatmen 
across the channel ; and Sara was conveyed to her long 
home. I saw Abraham early in December, 1847, and 
the bed which he made for Sara, on that bleak sea-shore. 
The turf wall was still unbroken ; the smoke, where the 
fire had been made, had left its blackness ; and a piece 
of turf, partly consumed, was lying by this hearth ; the 
heath-bed had not been stirred, and I begged Mrs. S. 
to keep it from the inroad of cattle. A wall of stone 
should be built around that dwelling, and the traveler 
pointed to it, as a relic of the greatest interest. — A 
relic of Ireland's woes ! 

It is said that Sara, in her father's house, was " fair 
to look upon," and enjoyed in plenty the good things of 
this life ; and, says Mrs. S., " when first I saw her the 
sun was shining in full strength upon her marble face ; 
and so swollen its wrinkles were smoothed ; her counte- 
nance was mild, her manner modest and pleasing, and 
she was an object of much admiration. She lay in that 
lowly bed in storm and sunshine, by night and by day, 
till the " good God," as she expressed it, " should plaise 
to take her away :" yet lowly as was her couch, lonely 
as was her wake, unostentatious as was her burial, few, 
in her condition, were honored with so good a one. 

In the same vicinity was the bed of a little orphan 
girl, who had crept into a hole in the bank, and died 
one night, with no one to spread her heath -bed, or to 



128 ANNALS OF THE 

close her eyes, or wash and fit her for the grave. She 
died unheeded, the dogs lacerated the body, gnawed the 
bones, and strewed them about the bog. 

DEATH AND BURIAL OF ABRAHAM. 

Abraham called one day in December, at the house 
of Mr. Savage, and sorrow and hunger had greatly 
changed his looks. His garments which had been kept 
tidy by Sara, were now going to decay. He stood si- 
lently at the door, with a subdued look, and a little 
brown bag and staff in his hand. I saw him there, and 
among the throng marked his shades of sorrow, and in- 
quired who he was. " It is Abraham, the old hands 
that made Sara's bed," was the answer. 

Abraham knew and felt the change in himself, and 
seeking an opportunity, asked for a piece of soap, 
touching his collar, which Sara had always kept clean, 
saying, "I do not like the feel of it." Food and a 
little money were given him : he went away, and on 
his boggy path to his humble home he fell down and 
broke his arm ; he lingered on a few days in destitution 
and pain, and the next that we heard of him, two men 
who were walking toward sunset on Sabbath day, met 
his daughter who had a shelter in the mountain, where 
she had kept her father, with Abraham upon her back, 
with his arms about her neck, a loathsome corpse, which 
she had kept in her cabin for days, and was going alone 
with a spade in her hand the distance of an Irish mile, 
to bury him. They took the corpse and accompanied 
her, and put him into the ground as he was, neither with 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 129 

a coffin nor by the side of Sara whom he had loved and 
cherished so well. 

Thus died Sara and Abraham, and thus they were 
buried, and let their epitaph be — " Lovely and pleasant 
in their lives, though in death they were divided." 

DRINKING HABITS. 

Let the reader's mind be a little relieved by a subject 
different , though as painful in a moral sense as famine 
is in a natural one. I allude to the fearful , sinful use 
of all kinds of intoxicating drinks in Ireland in the time 
of the famine. Much noise has been made the last nine 
or ten years respecting the great temperance reform in 
that country. But who have been reformed ? Travel 
the length and breadth of the island, even in the midst 
of desolation and death, and in how many families when 
a piece of flesh meat can be afforded upon the dinner- 
table, would the tea-kettle for hot whisky be wanting 
at the close of dinner ? The more costly wines, too, 
were on the tables of the nobility, and not always want- 
ing among the gentry. The clergy of all denominations, 
in that country, are sad examples to the flock. Father 
Mathew is praised by some of these Bible ministers, be- 
cause he kept the " lower order" from fighting at fairs ; 
but the very fact that the vulgar were reclaimed, was a 
stigma upon temperance in their enlightened opinions. 
Four years and four months' residence in Ireland, 
changing from place to place, and meeting with many 
ministers of all denominations, not a solitary case do I 
recollect of finding a minister of the Established, Pres- 



130 ANNALS OF THE 

byterian, or Methodist church, who did not plead for 
the moderate use of this fatal poison. I met with one 
Baptist minister, one Unitarian, and a few priests, who 
abstained entirely. 

The famine, if possible, urged many of the lovers of 
the cc good creature," to greater diligence in the prac- 
tice to u keep themselves up," as they said, in these 
dreadful times. They preached sermons on charity — 
they urged the people to greater-self-denial — they talk- 
ed of the great sin of improvidence, of which Ireland is 
emphatically guilty ; but few, very few, it is to be fear- 
ed, touched one of these burdens so much as with one 
of their fingers. There were noble cases of hard labor, 
and even curtailing of expenses, by some of the clergy ; 
even labor was protracted till it ended in death by 
some, but these were isolated cases indeed: 

An able writer, who wrote the pamphlet on Irish 
Improvidence, placed the subject in the most fearful 
light, when he said, " Next to the absurdity of Cork 
and Limerick exporting cargoes of Irish grain for sale, 
and at the same time receiving cargoes of American 
grain to be given away at the cost of the English peo- 
ple, may be ranked the folly — if it may not properly be 
called by some worse name — of seeing hundreds dying 
for want of food, at the same time permitting the con- 
version of as much grain as would feed the whole of 
those dying of starvation, and many more, into a fiery 
liquid, which it is well known, even to the distillers 
themselves, never saved a single life or improved a sin- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 131 

gle character, never prevented a single crime, or ele- 
vated the character of a single family by its use." 

Reader, ponder this well. — Enough grain, converted 
into a poison for body and soul, as would have fed all 
that starving multitude ; while the clergy were preach- 
ing, committees were in conclave, to stimulate to charity, 
and devise the most effectual methods to draw upon the 
purses of people abroad. 

And what shall be said of the pitiful landlords, who 
were still drinking their wine, pouring their doleful com- 
plaints into government's ears, that no rents were paid ; 
and many saying, as one of these wine-bibbers did, that 
his lazy tenants would not work for pay, for he had of- 
fered that morning, some men work who were hungry, 
and would pay them at night, and they walked away 
without accepting it. " How much pay did you offer V 
he was asked. " A pound of Indian meal," (Indian 
meal was then a penny a pound.) " Would you, sir, 
work for that, and wait till night for the meal, when 
you were then suffering V Much better try to procure 
it before night in some easier way. 

But these afflicted landlords, the same writer remarks, 
when exporting to the continent vast quantities of grain, 
which their poor starving tenants had labored to pro- 
cure, and were not allowed to eat a morsel of this food ; 
but buy it from others or starve. Neither can it be 
doubted, nor should it be concealed, that not a few of 
these landlords, while their grain was selling at a good 
price abroad, shared the benefit of many an Indian meal 
donation, for horses, hogs, fowls, and servants. The 



132 ANNALS OF THE 

guilty are left to make the application, none others are 
implicated. 

I would not say that every man who takes a glass of 
spirits, as he says, moderately, is guilty of downright 
dishonesty, or not to be trusted with the property of 
others ; but it may properly be said, that such are in 
the path to the hotbed where every evil work is culti- 
vated ; and, therefore, more to be scrupled than those 
who from conscience would " cut off a right arm or 
pluck out a right eye," rather than give offense. 

Had all the professed Christians in Ireland entirely 
excluded alchololic drinks from their tables and houses, 
thousands might now be living who have been starved. 

I was once in a miserable part of the country, where 
death was doing a fearful work, and was stopping in a 
house ranked among the respectables, when a company 
of ministers, who had been attending a public meeting 
in the town, were assembled for dinner. The dinner 
was what is generally provided for ministers— the richest 
and best. Wine and brandy were accompaniments. 
When these heralds of salvation heard a word of re- 
monstrance, they put on the religious cant, and cited me 
immediately and solemnly the " Marriage of Cana," 
and the tribunal of Timothy's stomach for my doom ; 
declaring that God sanctioned, yea required it ; and 
ratified it by taking in moderation what their conscience 
told them was duty. They were pointed directly to the 
suffering of the people for bread, and the great difficulty 
of procuring coffins, all this did not move their brandy- 
seared hearts. When in an hour after dinner the tea 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 133 

was served, as is the custom in Ireland, one of the 
daughters of the family passing a window, looked down 
upon the pavement and saw a corpse with a blanket 
spread over it, lying upon the walk beneath the window. 
It was a mother and infant, dead, and a daughter of six- 
teen had brought and laid her there, hoping to induce 
the people to put her in a coffin ; and as if she had been 
listening to the conversation at the dinner of the want 
of coffins, she had placed her mother under the very 
window and eye, where these wine-bibbing ministers 
might apply the lesson. All was hushed, the blinds 
were immediately down, and a few sixpences were quite 
unostentatiously sent out to the poor girl, as a begin- 
ning, to procure a coffin. The lesson ended here. 

And I would conclude this episode by saying, that at 
the door of professed Christians of the intelligent class, 
lies the sin of intemperance in that suffering country, 
and though some of them have preached and labored 
hard in those dark days, yet they have not done, what 
they could, and in this they should not be commended ; 
but rebuked most faithfully. 



CHAPTER V. 

" However darkly stained by sin, 
He is thy brother yet." 

It was at the house of Mr. Savage, at the Sound, 
where I first met with the Hon. William Butler. He 
insisted on my going to Erris, as a spot of all others the 
most wretched, offering kindly to pay my passage in an 
open boat, which was to take him there. We went : 
he observed on the passage, that he had always feared 
the water, and would prefer any death almost to that of 
drowning. He was drowned the next season while on a 
visit to the continent. 

We reached Belmullet ; he secured me a lodging ; 
but the rector called and invited me to spend the time 
at his house, and I did so. But here was a place 
which might justly be called the " fag-end" of misery. 
It semed to be a spinning out of all that was fearful in 
suffering, and whoever turned his eye there needed no 
other point of observation, to see all that famine and 
pestilence could do. It appeared like a vast crucible, 
where had been concocted all that was odious, all that 
was suffering ; and which had been emptied, leaving 
the dregs of the mass unfit for any use. 

Well did James Tuke say, in his graphic description 



THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 135 

of Erris, that he had visited the wasted remnants of 
the once noble Red Man in North America, and the 
" negro-quarter" of the degraded and enslaved Afri- 
can ; but never had he seen misery so intense, or phy- 
sical degradation so complete, as among the dwellers in 
the bog-holes of Erris. 

" Figure and mien, complexion and attire, 
Are leagued to strike dismay." 

The few resident landlords in this barony, containing 
in the year 1846, a population of twenty-eight thou- 
sand, were now reduced, by the extreme poverty of the 
tenantry, to a state of almost hopeless desperation. 
The poor-house was a distance of forty miles to Bal- 
lina ; and the population since the famine was reduced 
to twenty thousand — ten thousand of these on the ex- 
treme borders of starvation — crawling about the streets 
— lying under the windows of such as had a little food, 
in a state of almost nudity. Being situated on the 
north-east coast of Mayo, it has the Atlantic roaring 
and dashing upon two sides of it ; and where the 
wretched dwellers of its coasts are hunting for sea- 
weed, sand-eels, &c, to appease their hunger, and 
where in many cases, I truly thought that man had 
nearly lost the image in which he was created. This 
coast is noted for shipwrecks ; and many of the in- 
habitants, in former days, have subsisted very com- 
fortably upon the spoils. 

A Mrs. D. called one morning to take a walk with 
me upon a part of the sea-coast, called u Cross." 



136 ANNALS OF THE 

Nature here seemed to have put on her wildest dress, 
for in the whole barony of Erris there is but one tree, 
and that a stinted one ; and this barony extends thirty- 
five miles. But here our walk seemed to be through 
something unlike all I had seen. In some places 
nature appeared like a maniac, who, in her ravings, 
had disheveled her locks and tattered her garments. In 
others, she put on a desponding look, as if almost de- 
spairing, yet not not unwilling to be restored, if there 
were any to comfort her ; in others, the bold cliffs 
dashed by the maddening waves, seemed like a lion 
rising from his lair, and going forth in fury for his 
prey. Three miles presented us with grand, beautiful, 
and painful scenes ; the air was salubrious — the sun 
was bright ; the unroofed cabins silent and dreary, told 
us that the ejected inmates were wandering shelterless 
or dead, many of whom were buried under the ruins, 
who were found starved in a putrid state ; and having 
no coffins, the stones of the cabins were tumbled upon 
them. Mrs. D. was one of those sensitive beings who 
are capable of enjoying the beauties of nature, and 
capable too of suffering most keenly. She had tasted 
deeply of sorrow — was a new-made widow — her mother 
had died but a few months previous — an adopted child, 
a lovely niece of ten years old, had died a few weeks 
before. As we neared the burying-ground she pointed 
to the spot, saying, " There I put her, my fair blos- 
som ; and there, by her side, I put her uncle," (mean- 
ing her husband,) " five weeks after ; but you must 
excuse me from taking you there, for I could not ven- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 137 

ture myself where they lie, because they will give me 
no welcome, nor speak a kind word, as they used to 
do." We passed over sand-banks and ditches, to the 
cottage where her father and mother had lived and 
died, leaving two sisters and two brothers on the pa- 
ternal estate. The cottage had no wicket-gate, no 
flowers nor shrubs ; but standing upon the margin of 
the lake, it seemed modestly to say, " Walk in, my 
comforts shall be equal to all I have promised." The 
interior was neat. Here were the remains of an an- 
cient family, who had "lived to enjoy," who could 
walk or ride, could entertain guests in true Irish hospi- 
tality, for many a century back; but death had re- 
moved the head of the family ; famine had wasted the 
tenantry ; the fields were neglected ; " and here," 
said the sister who kept the cottage, " we are sitting as 
you see, with little to cheer us, and less to hope for the 
future." We visited the churchyard, which my com- 
panion thought she could not see — a brother offered to 
be her companion — and we found it upon a rising hil- 
lock, by the sea-side ; it was a Protestant one, and a 
snug church had stood near ; but the landholder, Mr. 
Bingham, had caused it to be taken down, and another 
built in a town or village called Bingham's Town. 
Here was another specimen of the peculiar grave-yards 
on the sea-coast of Ireland. The better classes have a 
monument of rough stones put over the whole surface 
of the grave, elevated a few feet, and cemented with 
mortar. The poorer classes must be content to lie 
under a simple covering of rough stones, without being 



138 ANNALS OF THE 

elevated or cemented. We waited a few moments till 
the sister, who sat down upon the grave of the little 
one, had indulged her grief for the two departed, and 
I only heard her say, " Ah ! and you will not speak to 
me." An ancient abbey was near, said to be a 
thousand years old ; and so closely had the Catholics 
buried their dead there that it appeared at a little dis- 
tance, like one vast pile of stones tumbled together. 
The Protestants and Romanists do not choose to place 
their dead in contact ; and these two were distinct ; 
but they, also, had their " respectable monuments," 
for we saw, on a nearer approach, that this grave-yard 
had elevated cemented tombstones ; the ground was 
high, and no walls, but the roaring old sea upon one 
side — which sometimes boldly reaches out and snatches 
a sleeper from his bed. The scattered bones that lay 
about, told that it must long have been the " place of 
skulls." The last year had made great accessions to 
the pile, which could easily be known by their fresh- 
ness, and ropes of straw and undried grass brought 
here by relatives, to put over the uncoffined bodies 
of their friends. Here were deposited five or six sail- 
ors, belonging to a vessel from Greenock, which was 
wrecked on this coast the preceding spring. The 
bodies washed ashore, and a brother of the lady with 
me dug a pit and put them in, spreading over their 
faces the skirt of one of their overcoats, " to screen," 
as he said, " the cruel clay from their eyes." These 
poor sailors, unknown and unwept, were buried by the 
hand of a stranger, on a foreign shore ; but somewhere 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 139 

they might have had mothers who waited and asked in 
vain for the absent ship. 

As these sailors have no monument to tell their pa- 
rentage, let it be recorded here, that in the spring of 
1847, a vessel was wrecked on the desolate coast of 
Erris, and every soul on board was lost. The vessel 
sailed from Greenock, in Scotland. While sitting in 
the cottage, in the evening, the lady who accompanied 
me brought a lid of a box, which was taken from among 
the wreck of that lost ship, and on it was written : — 

" Soda Biscuit, by , Corner of Beekman and 

Cliff Street, New York." The name was so defaced 
it could not be made out. This added new interest to 
the shipwreck, when meeting an inscription from the 
street where I had lived, and the shop in which I had 
traded, and was told that the vessel was freighted with 
provisions for the starving of Ireland. This was a 
mistake. 

In the morning, when the sun was rising, we ascend- 
ed a hill, among the desolate cabins, where once was 
the song of health, and where far off in the west, the 
sea stretched wide, and the variegated clouds gilded 
with the morning sun, were dipping apparently in its 
waters. This, said a daughter of the family, was 
once a pretty and a grand spot ; here, two years ago, 
these desolate fields were cultivated, and content and 
cheerfulness were in every cabin. Now, from morning 
to night they wander in search of a turnip, or go to the 
sea for sea-weed to boil, and often have we found a 
corpse at the door, that the brother you see "might 



140 ANNALS OF THE 

put a board on 'em." We have often seen an ass 
passing our window carrying a corpse, wound about 
with some old remnant of a blanket or sheet ; and thus, 
flung across its back, a father or mother, wife or hus- 
band, was carried to the grave. Sometimes, when the 
corpse was a little child, or it might be more than one, 
they were put into a couple of baskets, and thus bal- 
anced upon the sides of the ass, this melancholy hearse 
proceeded on without a friend to follow it, but the one 
who was guiding the beast. These burials tell more of 
the paralysing effects of famine than anything else can 
do ; for the Irish in all ages, have been celebrated for 
their attention to the interment of their dead, sparing 
no expense. 

When I stood in the burying-ground in that parish, 
I saw the brown silken hair of a young girl, waving 
gently through a little cleft of stones, that lay loosely 
upon her young breast. They had not room to put her 
beneath the surface, but slightly, and a little green 
grass was pulled and spread over, and then covered 
with stones. I never shall forget it. 

" The blast of the desert comes, 
Her loose hair flew on the wind." 

In some parts the soil was manured with the slain. 
When the famine first commenced, efforts were made 
to procure coffins ; but the distress became so great 
to the living, that every penny that could be pro- 
cured must be given for food ; and the famished rel- 
atives, at last, were grateful if some hand stronger 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 141 

than theirs would dig the pit, and put down the uncof- 
fined body. 

One Sabbath, when I was in Erris, the day was so 
stormy that the church service was suspended. A 
barefooted woman, who one year before had called to 
sell milk and kept a fine dairy, came into the house 
where I was, and calling me by name, said : " Will ye 
give me- something to buy a coffin to put on my hus- 
band ; he died yesterday on me, and it would be a pity 
to put him in the ground without a board, and he is so 
swelled, ma'am, not a ha'porth of his legs or belly but 
is ready to burst, and but a fivepence-halfpenny could 
I gather, and the little boys are ashamed to go out and 
ask the charity for him." 

This is an illustration not only of the state into which 
famine has thrown the country, but the apathy of feel- 
ing which the most tender-hearted people on the globe 
manifested. A woman compelled to go out in a most 
perilous storm, upon a wild sea-coast, unprotected by 
clothes, and without a morsel of food for twenty -four 
hours, to procure a coffin for her husband, who had 
died by starvation ! 

THE SOLDIERS OF BELMULLET. 

Among the marvels and dreadfuls of Erris, the 
Queen's soldiers certainly deserve a place in history. 
Government in her mercy had deposited in a shop some 
tons of Indian meal, to be sold or given out, as the 
Commissariat should direct, for the benefit of the peo- 
ple. This meal was in statu quo, and hunger was 



142 ANNALS OF THE 

making fearful inroads. One hundred and fifty-one 
soldiers, cap-a-pie, were marching before and around 
this shop, with bayonets erect, from early dawn till late 
in " dusky eve," to guard this meal. They certainly 
made a warlike bloody-looking array, when contrasted 
with the haggard, meager, squalid skeletons that were 
grouped in starving multitudes about them, who, if the 
whole ten thousand starving ones in the barony had 
been disposed to rise en masse, scarcely had strength 
to have broken open a door of the shop, or to have 
knocked down a soldier ; but here they were, glistening 
in bright armor, and the people dying with hunger 
about it. These soldiers were alive to their duty on 
all and every occasion. One Sabbath morning when 
the church prayers were in full progress, they marched 
up under arms, with fife and drum playing merrily the 
good old tune of " Rory O'More." The modest rec- 
tor suspended operations, the congregation in breath- 
less silence, most of them arose from their seats ; the 
army entered, doffed their caps, planted their arms, 
and quietly, if not decently, took their seats, and sat 
till prayers and sermon were ended ; as soon as " Old 
Hundred" closed the worship, these soldiers resumed 
their arms, and the musicians, upon the threshold of 
the door, struck up " The Girl I Left Behind Me ;" 
and the congregation, a little confused, walked out. I 
never heard it applauded nor ever heard it censured, 
but by one. To say the least of the morality of Erris, 
their drinking, and card-playing, and dancing habits, 
would well comport with the army or navy ; but they 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 143 

were quite in advance of anything I had seen in 
an}' part of Ireland. Here I saw the cobweb covering 
flung about fallen man, to hide his deformity, torn aside, 
and scarcely a vestige was there of beauty, amiability, 
or even decency left. 

The hotel keeper was in the habit of collecting a few 
shillings from lodgers and travelers, and distributing 
them in pennies, to the starving, in the morning. 
These recipients were as ravenous as hungry lions and 
tigers, as void of reason, and more disgusting to the 
sight. If man is to be guided by reason, then when 
reason is extinct, upon what can he fall back 1 If the 
instinct that is planted in man is the image of God, in 
which He is made, then where this God is extinguished 
there can be nothing but a wreck — a mass of neither 
man nor brute ; for if he have lost the image of God, 
and has not the instinct of animals, he stands out an 
unnatural growth, to be wondered at rather than ad- 
mired. I could scarcely believe that these creatures 
were my fellow -beings. Never had I seen slaves so 
degraded ; and here I learnt that there are many pages 
in the volume of slavery, and that every branch of it 
proceeds from one and the same root, though it assumes 
different shapes. These poor creatures are in as vir- 
tual bondage to their landlords and superiors as is pos- 
sible for mind or body to be. They cannot work unless 
they bid them ; they cannot eat unless they feed them ; 
and they cannot get away unless they help them. 

From Belmullet, Rosport was my destiny, a distance 
of twelve miles — a romantic place on the sea-coast, 



144 ANNALS OF THE 

where resided three families of comparative comfort ; 
but their comforts were threatened most fearfully by 
the dreadful scourge ; fever was everywhere, and hun- 
ger indeed had filled a grave-yard, which lay at the 
foot of a mountain, so full that scarcely any distinction 
could be seen of graves, but now and then a stick at 
the head or foot of one. By the road-side a family of 
four or five had made a temporary shelter, waiting for 
a son to die, whom they had brought some miles across 
the mountains, that he might be buried in a grave-yard 
where the dogs would not find him, as there was a wall 
about this. He died of consumption, and the family 
were fed while there, and then went away when they 
had buried their boy. The family of Samuel Bourne 
were the most comfortable, but they had a burden like 
an incubus, with the mass of starving creatures. Mr. 
Carey, the Coast Guard, was kind, and his wife and 
daughters patterns of industry and attention to the 
poor ; but with limited means, what could they do to 
stay the plague ? Everything that could be eaten was 
sought out and devoured, and the most hazardous at- 
tempts were made to appease hunger by the people. 
This coast has some of the greatest objects of curiosity ; 
and so long have the inhabitants been accustomed to 
look at them, that they walk fearlessly upon the dan- 
gerous precipices, and even descend them to the sea, in 
search of eggs, which the sea-gulls deposit there, in the 
sides of the cliffs. Two women presumptuously descend- 
ed one of these cliffs, not far from Mr. Carey's, in search 
of sloke, which is gathered from the sea. They, in 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 145 

their hunger, ventured to stop till the tide washed in 
and swept them away. Two men were dashed from a 
fearful height and dreadfully mangled ; — one was killed 
instantly — the other lingered a few weeks and died. 
They were both in search of eggs to appease hunger. 
They seemed to face danger in a most deliberate man- 
ner, and go where none but the goat or eagle would 
venture. In this parish I found a specimen of that 
foolish pride and inability of a class of genteel Irish 
women, to do anything when difficulties present them- 
selves. It was a young lady who lived back two miles 
upon the mountain, who belonged to one of the faded 
Irish " respectables ;" she was educated in the popular 
genteel superficial style, and the family had some of 
them died, and all broken down : she, with her brother- 
in-law, from Dublin, was staying in a thatched cottage, 
which had yet the remains of taste and struggling gen- 
tility. Two of the peasant women had seen Mr. 
Bourne and me going that way, and by a shorter path 
had hastened and given the Miss notice, so that when 
we entered, the cottage was in trim, and she in due 
order to receive us. But that pitiful effort was to me 
painful to witness, having been told that she suffered 
hunger, and knew no possible way of escape, yet she as- 
sumed a magnanimity of spirit and complained not, 
only expressed much pity for the poor tenants on the 
land about her, and begged us if possible that we would 
send some relief. Her table was spread with the 
fashionable ornaments which adorn the drawing-rooms 
of the rich ; and she, with a light scarf hung carelessly 



146 ANNALS OF THE 

about her shoulders, genteel in form and pretty in 
feature, was already looking from eyes that were put- 
ting on the famine stare. u What can be done with 
that helpless, proud, interesting girl 1" said Mr. Bourne, 
as we passed away ; " she must die in all her pride, if 
some relief is not speedily found ! she cannot work, she 
would not go to the work-house, and there, upon that 
desolate mountain, she will probably pine away un- 
heeded !" I have not heard what became of this pretty 
girl of the mountain since. " She was covered with 
the light of beauty, but her heart was the house of 
pride." Another interesting character, the antipodes 
of the mountain girl, resided in the family of Mr. 
Bourne. Nature had endowed her with good sense, 
education had enlarged her intellect, and traveling had 
given her that ease of manner and address that made 
her accessible to all, without stooping from that dignity 
which properly repels all uncourteous familiarity. She 
had passed through great reverses : — had been to India 
— there had a handsome legacy bequeathed — was ship- 
wrecked and lost all ; — went to South and North 
America — her health was destroyed, but her heart 
subdued, and brought into sweet submission to Christ, 
and she resolved to spend the remainder of her days in 
doing good to others, however humble their station 
might be. She had heard of this family, stationed on 
this desolate spot, who had interesting sons and daugh- 
ters that wished for instruction. There she went, and 
determined to die and be buried there, secluded from 
the world. She had written her travels, but had placed 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 147 

her manuscripts in hands who were not to publish them 
till after her death. On that bleak coast she had found 
where a company of seventeen shipwrecked sailors had 
been buried, in a mound, and she had requested to lie 
near their resting-place. She took me to walk, and 
showed me the forbidding-looking spot. I could scarcely 
think her sincere, but she assured me that it was a 
lovely spot to her. She was then perhaps not yet 
fifty, and why she should think of soon dying and lying 
there I could not tell ; but the intelligent and ac- 
complished Miss Wilson died in a few months after, in 
the full hope of a happy immortality, and was buried 
with the shipwrecked sailors on that rocky coast. 

" She sleeps in unenvied repose, and I would not wake her." 

Here in a humble cabin the kind Miss Carey com^ 
menced a little school, to do what she could to keep 
alive the scattered lambs of that desolate parish, in 
order that she might give them, through some relief 
society, a little food once a day, and teach them to read. 
Her cabin was soon filled, and without the promise of 
any reward she labored on, happy to see the avidity 
with which these poor children received instruction, 
and for a year she continued her labor of love with but 
little remuneration, and at last, with much regret, was 
obliged to return them to their mountain home — per- 
haps to perish. It was affecting everywhere in the 
famine, to witness the pale emaciated children, walking 
barefoot for miles to school, and study and work till 
three o'clock, for the scanty meal of stirabout, or piece 



148 ANNALS OF THE 

of bread. Dr. Edgar had established an industrial 
school among the tenantry of Samuel Bourne, but when 
I visited it no other instruction had been given but 
knitting and sewing. It was at Samuel Bourne's that I 
met with James Tuke, whose faithful researches and 
candid recitals of the state of Erris and Connaught 
have lived and will live, in spite of all opposition. I 
rode with him from Rosport to Ballina, and many a 
poor suffering one received not only a kind word, but a 
shilling or half-crown, as we passed along. His friend- 
ship for Ireland overlooked all accidental discrepancies 
in that misjudged people, and from effects he went to 
causes, and placed the defects at the door of the lawful 
owner. My stay in the pretty town of Ballina was a 
short one, and again I reached the dismal Belmullet. 
•Drinking and its sad concomitants were everywhere 
manifest ; not among the " vulgar lower order," but 
the " respectable" class. The sad fate of a Protestant 
curate, who was in the asylum, is well known, as well 
as that of the hotel keeper, who died shortly after my 
visit there. 

A fresh curate had been stationed in Bellmullet, and 
his prudent sober course indicated good. Three miles 
from the town lived a single lady, who went by the name 
of the Queen of Erris, on account of some clever doings 
in a court ; and one sunny morning I took a walk to 
her dwelling near the sea. A sight which had never 
before fallen to my lot to witness, was here in progress. 
Two well-dressed men, mounted on fine horses, furnished 
with pistols, accompanied by a footman, passed, and 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 149 

turned into a miserable hamlet, and instantly all was in 
motion ; every man, woman, and child "who had strength 
to walk was out. Soon I perceived the footman driving 
cows and sheep into the main road, while the armed 
gentry kept all opposition at bay, by showing that death 
was in their pistols if any showed resistance. It was a 
most affecting sight. Some were clasping their hands, 
dropping upon their knees, and earnestly imploring the 
good God to save them the last cow, calf, or sheep, for 
their hungry little ones ; some were standing in mute 
despair, as they saw their only hope departing, while 
others followed in mournful procession, as the cattle 
and sheep were all gathered from every field in the par- 
ish, and congregated at the foot of a hill, where the brisk 
" drivers" had collected them, to take them, in a flock 
to the town. My visit to the Queen was postponed. I 
followed in that procession ; a long hill was before us, 
the sun was shining upon the clearest sky, and lighted 
up a company which illy contrasted with that of Jacob, 
when he went out to meet his angry brother Esau. The 
flocks and herds might be as beautiful ; but the warlike 
drivers, and ragged, hungry, imploring oppressed ones 
that followed, could hardly claim a standing with Jacob 
and his family. The hill was ascended, and the poor 
people halted and looking a sad adieu turned back ; and 
a few exclaimed, " We're lawst, not a ha'porth have 
the blackguards left to a divil of us," others spoke not, 
and a few were weeping. Death must now be their 
destiny. 

All returned but one boy, whose age was about four- 



150 ANNALS OF THE 

teen years ; he stood as if in a struggle of feeling, till 
the people had gone from his sight, and the " drivers" 
were descending the hill on the other side. Instantly 
he rushed between the u drivers" and flock, and before 
the mouth of these loaded pistols he ran among the cat- 
tle, screaming, and put the whole flock in confusion, 
running hither and thither, the astonished " drivers" 
threatening death. The boy heeding nothing but the 
main point, scattered and routed the whole flock ; the 
people heard the noise and ran, the "drivers," whether 
in astonishment, or whether willing to show lenity, (let 
their own hearts judge,) rode away, the inhabitants ex- 
ulted, and the flock were soon in the inclosures of the 
owners. But that noble-minded heroic boy was the 
wonder ; facing clanger alone, and saving for a whole 
parish what a whole parish had not dared to attempt ! 
His name should never be forgotten, and a pension for 
life is his due. 

A letter is here inserted, which will show faintly the 
manner of distributing donations, and the habits of the 
people. 

" Belmullet, October 30th, 1847. 

" My Dear Sir : — Please prepare yourself. I am 
about applying some of those " offensive points" in my 
character, which I so eminently possess ; and which may 
require not only your true charity, but untiring patience, 
to plod through. I have been riding and walking 
through desolate Erris, and in worse than despair, if 
possible, have sat down, asking, What am I to do 1 
What can I do ? 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 151 

u Every effort of the friends of Ireland is baffled by 
the demoralizing effects that feeding a starving peasan 
try without labor has produced. And now the sound 
again is echoing and re-echoing, that on the 1st of No- 
vember, the boilers upon mountain and in glen would be 
foaming and splashing with Indian meal ; while the va- 
rious idlers shall have nothing to do but fight their way 
over necks of old women and starved children, missiles 
of policemen, elbows and fists of aspirants, to secure the 
lucky hodge-podge into can and noggin, pot and bucket ; 
and trail over ditch and through bog, from a quarter of 
a mile to five, as his hap may be ; then to sit down in 
his mud-built cabin, sup and gulp down the boon, lie 
down upon his straw till the hour of nine or ten will 
again summon him to the next warlike encounter. 

" Indeed, sir, your friend who was last here said he 
could think of nothing better, than to take up a turf 
cabin with its inmates and appurtenances, and set it 
down in England. I can outdo him in invention. I 
would take some half-dozen of your George Thompsons 
— if so many truly independent members you have — and 
would transport them through the waste lands of Erris, 
and seat them snugly around a boiler under full play. 
They should sit unobserved, and see the whole working 
of the machinery. The array of rags — each equipped 
with his canteen to hold his precious gift, should ap- 
proach ; the ghastly features, staring eyes, bony fingers, 
slender legs ; in fact, ghosts and hobgoblins, hags and 
imps, should draw near, the fighting and tearing, tum- 
bling and scratching should commence and go on, till the 



152 ANNALS OF THE 

boiler was emptied, and these fac similes of fighting 
dogs, tigers, and wolves, had well cleared the premises. 
I then would invite them to a seat in Samuel Stock's, 
Samuel Bourne's, and James O'Donnell's parlors. 
Then let them patiently watch from ten to twelve, from 
twelve to two, and perchance from two till four, and 
witness the intensity of action in making out lines, and 
diagrams, and figures, to show in plain black and white 
to government that Pat Flannagan, Samuel Murphy, 
Biddy Aigin, and Molly Sullivan, had each his and her 
pound of meal made into a stirabout, on the 3d of No- 
vember, Anno Domini 1847. And let it be understood 
that these Pat Flannagans, Aigins, and Murphys had 
only to spend the day in the terrific contests before de- 
scribed, to earn this pound of meal, and then betake 
themselves to mountains and dens, turf hovels, and mud 
hovels, to crawl in, and then and there ' sup up' this 
life-giving, life -inspiring stimulus. They should further 
be told that these Stocks, Bournes, O'Donnels, &c. had 
the privilege of handing over these nightly made out 
documents to officers, paid from six to ten, from ten to 
twenty shillings per day, that they might have the 
promise of a six months' nightly campaign, should pa- 
pers be found to be true and legible, as aforetime. 

" This is but a short preface to the story ; my heart 
sickens at looking over the utter wasting of all that was 
once cheerful, interesting, and kind in these peasantry. 
Hunger and idleness have left them a prey to every im- 
morality ; and if they do not soon practice every vice 
attendant on such a state of things, it will be because 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 153 

they have not the power. Many are now maniacs, some 
desperate, and some idiots. Human nature is coming 
forth in every deformity that she can put on, while in 
the flesh ; and should I stay in Ireland six months longer, 
I shall not be astonished at seeing any deeds of wicked- 
ness performed, even by those who one year ago might 
apparently have been as free from guilt as any among 
us. I have not been able yet, with all my republican 
training, to lose the old-school principle of man's total 
lost state. I have never yet seen him without the re- 
straints of custom or religion anything but a demon in 
embryo, if not in full maturity ; doing not only what he 
can, but sighing and longing to do more. The flood- 
gates in Ireland are certainly set open, and the torrent 
has already made fearful ravages. 

" From Clare and Tipperary what do we hear? One 
post after another runs to tell that not only deeds of 
darkness are done, but deeds of daylight desperation, 
sufficient to startle the firmest. What Moses shall 
stand up to plead with God 1 What Phineas shall rush 
in to stay the plague 1 Where are your men of moral, 
yes, of spiritual might ? You have them ; then bring 
them out ! I look across that narrow channel. I see 
the graves of martyrs. I see the graves of men whose 
daring minds stood forth in all the majesty of greatness, 
to speak for truth and justice ; and though they may 
long since have taken flight, where are their mantles 1 
Where is your George Thompson 1 He who shook the 
United States from Maine to Georgia, in pleading long 
and loud for the down-trodden black man ? Can he not, 



154 ANNALS OF THE 

will he not lift his voice for poor Ireland ? She who 
stands shivering, sinking on the Isthmus, between two 
worlds, apparently not fit for either. Will he not reach 
forth a kindly hand, and try to snatch this once inter- 
esting and lovely, though now forlorn and forsaken crea- 
ture, from her fearful position 1 Must she, shall she 
die 1 Will proud England lose so bright a gem as Ire- 
land might have been in her crown ? Will she lose her ; 
when the distaff, and the spade, the plow and the fish- 
ing net, might again make her mountains and her val- 
leys rejoice I — When the song of the husbandman and 
the laugh of the milkmaid, might make her green isle 
the home of thousands, who are now sinking and dying 
in wasting despair. 

" Do you say she is intriguing — she is indolent and 
treacherous 1 Try her once more ; put instruments of 
working warfare into her hands ; hold up the soul-stir- 
ring stimulus of remuneration to her \ give her no time 
for meditating plunder and bloodshed ; give her no in- 
ducement to be reckless of a life that exists only to suf- 
fer. Feed her not in idleness, nor taunt her with her 
nakedness and poverty, till her wasted, palsied limbs 
have been washed and clothed — till her empty stomach 
has been filled, and filled too with food of her own earn- 
ing, when she shall have strength to do it. Give her a 
little spot on the loved isle she can call her own, where 
she can i sit under her own vine and fig-tree, and none 
to make her afraid,' and force her not to flee to a distant 
clime to purchase that bread that would be sweeter on 
her own native soil. Do you say you cannot feed and 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 155 

pay four millions of these your subjects ? Then call on 
your transatlantic sister to give you food for them. The 
earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof 5 and though 
she has a right to say she will not send Ireland food to 
keep them strong in idleness, she has no right to say 
she will not send them food to give them strength for 
labor. She has not a heart to say it ; foul as her hands 
may be with slavery, yet she will feed the hungry with 
a cheerful hand. If she has not done her duty there is 
room for repentance, yes, effectual repentance. Her 
fields, the past season, have been waving with rich corn, 
and her storehouses are filling with the golden harvest. 
You have given her gold in profusion, for the produce 
of her soil. The blast of the potatoe has been to her 
the blossoming and ripening of her pastures — her wav- 
ing fields of pulse and corn. The husbandman has been 
stimulated to plow up fresh lands, go that he might 
fill his granaries abundantly with the rich harvest, be- 
cause free trade has opened your ports, and you will 
demand more of his corn ; and why should he not send 
over a few sheaves, as a thank-offering to God, for all 
this bounty ? America will do it if required ; but an 
inquiry has come across the ocean : Is it right to feed 
a country to encourage idleness — will not the evil be 
much greater than the good ? Answer, you who are 
statesmen — you who are Christians ; answer, you who 
can. Look at the peasantry of Ireland three years ago, 
and look at them now ! Even their enemies must ac- 
knowledge that they are a tractable race, to have de- 
veloped so much intrigue and cunning under the train- 



156 ANNALS OF THE 

ing of the last two years. Shall I scold, shall I preach, 
shall I entreat any more ? What is woman's legislating 
amid the din of so many wise magicians, soothsayers, 
and astrologers, as have set up for Ireland the last two 
j^ears. Prophets and priests have so far failed ; but 
certainly there must be a true chord to strike some- 
where ; for what is now wrong, when traced to its source, 
may disclose the hidden cause of the evil, and put the 
willing investigator into a position to work an amend- 
ment. 

" You, sir, who know Erris, tell, if you can, how the 
landlords can support the poor by taxation, to give them 
food, when the few resident landlords are nothing, and 
worse than nothing, for they are paupers in the full 
sense of the word. What can Samuel Bourne, James 
O'Donnell, and such like men do in their present posi- 
tion ? If they have done wrong, and do it no more, the 
torrent is so strong that they cannot withstand it. I 
must, and will plead, though I plead in vain, that some- 
thing may be done to give them work. I have just re- 
ceived a letter from the curate of Bingham's Town, say- 
ing that he could set all his poor parish, both the wo- 
men and children, to work, and find a market for their 
knitting and cloth, if he could command a few pounds 
to purchase the materials. He is young and indefati- 
gable, kind-hearted and poor, and no proselyte. Mrs. 
Stock has done well in her industrial department. The 
Hon. William Butler has purchased cloth of her, for a 
coat to wear himself, which the poor women spun, and 
gave a good price for it. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 157 

" I pray you, sir, if this malignant letter do not terrify 
you, write and say what must be done. 

" A. Nicholson." 

A week had I been watching a passage to the Sound, 
and November 9th, 1847, at six o'clock on Monday 
morning, I stepped into a filthy looking boat, with filthy 
looking men jabbering Irish, and sat down on a pile of 
wet straw, for the rain and sea were still pouring and 
splashing upon us ; and there soaked and drenched, 
amid rain, wave and tempest, I sat till nearly sunset, 
when the storm ceased, the clouds made an opening for 
the sun, the air became sultry, and the sea like a molten 
looking-glass. " How long have you sailed this boat 
around this fearful coast V 9 the captain was asked. 
" Twelve years, and not an accident has once happened 
to me." The boatmen were obliged to row us in with 
oars, for not a motion was upon the sea, nor a breeze in 
the air. Strange and sudden change ! 

The poor fishermen at the Sound had loosened their 
boats from the fastenings, and gone out with their nets 
upon the calm waters. 

My wet clothes were not adjusted, when in awful 
majesty the Almighty seemed riding upon the whirlwind 
and storm ; the rushing of the tempest lashed the af- 
frighted sea to a fury, the waves in fearful roar dashed 
over the lofty pier, the blackened clouds were tossing 
and rolling like a scroll together, and the earth seemed 
moved as if at the coming of Christ. I actually sat 
down in a' window that overlooked the Sound, and wait- 



158 ANNALS OF THE 

ed in glad suspense the approach of that cloud which 
should bear the chariot wheels of the Savior to judg- 
ment ; slates were hurled from the roof — windows were 
broken — doors burst open, and the confused crash so 
astonished all that none attempted to speak. So black 
were the clouds, that night scarcely was perceived, and 
had the "graves opened," and the " sea given up her 
dead," the living would not have known it, for the 
breath of the Almighty had not kindled the grand con- 
flagration ; till past midnight the wind and the sea kept 
up the sublime roaring. 

But where were the poor fishermen and the captain 
who had never met an accident 1 He was wrecked. The 
morning dawned, the sun looked out upon a molten sea 
again, whose placid face seemed to say, " I am satis- 
fied." But the stillness of the sea was soon broken by 
the wail of widows and orphans who were lamenting in 
loud cries the loss of those they loved. Nineteen of 
these fishermen, the " stoutest and best," said Mr. 
Savage, are swallowed in the deep. Honest and indus- 
trious, they had stood waiting in fearful suspense, in 
hunger, and looking in despair upon the tumultuous 
waves that morning, saj'ing, " If the good God don't 
still the storm we're all destrawed." He had stilled it, 
and nineteen were lost. Three among the hapless crew 
struggled with the fearful tempest, and reached the shore, 
crawled up the cliffs, and were found upon the moun- 
tains dead, on the way to their cabins. 

On the 28th of November, a fisherman's widow called 
in, who had been twenty miles, to " prove," as she said, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 159 

her husband, who had been washed ashore, and buried 
without a coffin ; she bought a white coffin and took it 
to the spot with her own hands, she dug him from his 
grave, and " proved" him by a leather button she had 
sewed upon some part of his clothes. 

December 3d. — Another night of darkness and ter- 
rible storm. The lightning threw a blue luster upon 
everything, — the affrighted daughters turned pale, — the 
mother sat in a dark corner, now and then giving a stifled 
groan, — shrinking before the voice of Jehovah when he 
thundered in the heavens. The next morning while the 
tempest was still high, a sorrowing old mother and young 
wife had come, bearing on a cart the body of the son 
who was drowned on the 9th. The white coffin besmear- 
ed with tar stood upon the pier ; the mother, wife, and 
sisters were beside it, mingling their loud lamentations 
with the storm. " He was as fine a young lad as ever 
put the oar across the curragh, and had the larnin' in- 
tircly," said the old mother. 

The scenes on this coast that dreadful winter, are 
scenes of awful remembrance, and one bright spot alone 
cheered the sadness. It had been the practice for the 
mother and daughters to assemble in a retired room 
in the evening for reading the scriptures and prayer. 
One evening a daughter of the family came from the 
kitchen with the strange glad message, that one of the 
laboring men had requested that the lady should, (" if 
it wouldn't be too much,") come down to the kitchen 
and read to them there. Joyfully we all went, and found 
there a company of more than twenty, all quietly seated 



160 ANNALS OF THE 

on forms ; the kitchen in the best order, and a bright 
fire upon the hearth. They all rose as we entered, and 
one said, " We wouldn't be bold, lady, but may be ye 
wouldn't refuse to raid a little to us." Testaments were 
procured — candles lighted— and these simple-hearted 
rustics in their turn read with us, making comments as 
we passed, till the scene from the interesting became 
affecting. We prayed together, and when we rose from 
our knees, one said, " We never haird so much of the 
good Christ before." They all thanked me, and gave 
me hearty blessings, and said good night, calling after 
me, and " may the good God give ye the long life, and 
happy death." Every night, when it was possible to do 
so, the kitchen was put in order, and a messenger sent 
to ask if the lady was ready. I saw one of these men 
twenty miles from there, standing by his cart,, when he 
spake (for I did not know him,) " God save ye, lady, 
we're lonesome without ye entirely, we don't have the 
raidin', and maybe ye'll come again." 

I passed the Christmas and New Year's-day in Achill, 
in the colony of Mr. Nangle, and to the honor of the 
inhabitants would say, they did not send me to Molly 
Vesey's to lodge ; but more than one family offered to 
entertain me. Mr. Nangle I heard preach again, and 
as he figured considerably in the first volume of my 
work, it may be said here that he refused any reconcili- 
ation, did not speak though a good opportunity present- 
ed ; and when he was expostulated with by a superin- 
tendent of his schools, who informed him that I had 
visited numbers of them, and put clothes upon some of 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 161 

the most destitute, he coolly replied, " If she can do any- 
good I am glad of it." 

He had eleven schools scattered through that region, 
reading the scriptures, and learning Irish ; but all 
through these parts might be seen the fallacy of dis- 
tributing a little over a great surface. The scanty 
allowance given to children once a day, and much of 
this bad food, kept them in lingering want, and many 
died at last. So with workmen. Mr. Nangle had 
many men working in his bogs, near Mr. Savage, and so 
scantily were they paid — sometimes but three-pence and 
three-pence-halfpenny a day — that some at least would 
have died but for the charity of Mrs. Savage. These 
men had families to feed, and must work till Saturday, 
then go nine miles into the colony to procure the Indian 
meal for the five days' work. This he truly called giv- 
ing his men " employ." 

Another sad evil prevalent in nearly all the relief- 
shops was, damaged Indian meal. And here without 
any personality, leaving the application where it belongs, 
having a knowledge of the nature of this article, it is 
placed on record, that the unground corn that was sent 
from America, and bought by the Government of Eng- 
land, and carried round the coast and then ground in 
the mills, which did not take off the hull, much of it 
having been damaged on the water, became wholly unfit 
for use, and was a most dangerous article for any stom- 
ach. Many of the shops I found where this material 
was foaming and sputtering in kettles over the fire, as 
if a handful of soda had been flung in, and sending 



162 ANNALS OF THE 

forth an odor really unpleasant ; and when any expostu- 
lation was made, the answer was, " They're quite glad 
to get it," or, " We use such as is put into our hands 
— the government must see to that." Such meal, a 
good American farmer would not give to his swine un- 
less for physic, and when the half-starved poor, who 
had been kept all their life on potatoes, took this sour, 
mouldy, harsh food, dysentery must be the result. 
One of the Dublin Relief Committee stated, that the 
government had kindly offered to save them the trouble 
of carriage by taking the American donations, as they 
arrived, and giving them an equiyalent of that which 
was already on the coast, which they had purchased : 
this equivalent was the corn above-mentioned, and the 
American donations were in the best possible order, 
and the very article to which the poor were entitled. 

Let the policemen speak if they will speak, and tes- 
tify, if many an injured ton of meal has not been 
flung into the sea in the night, from ports in Ireland, 
which was sent for the poor, and by neglect spoiled, 
while the objects for whom it was intended died without 
relief. The novel prudence, too, which prevailed 
nearly everywhere, was keeping the provisions for next 
week while the people were dying this, lest they should 
come short of funds, to buy more, or no more would 
be given them. 

The author of the Irish Crisis, January, 1848, gives 
a clear statement of many things relating to Grants, 
Public Works, and many other valuable statistics, and 
upon the whole it presents a fair picture for future 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 163 

generations to read of the nice management and kindly 
feelings of all parties ; and " that among upward of 
two thousand local officers to whom advances were 
made under this act,there is not one to which, so far as 
Government is informed, any suspicion of embezzlement 
attaches." It further states that the fasts set apart 
in London were kept with great solemnity, and that 
never in that city was there a winter of so little gayety. 
But he has not told posterity, and probably he did not 
know, that the winters of 1847 and 1848 in Dublin 
were winters of great hilarity among the gentry. The 
latter season, particularly, seemed to be a kind of jubi- 
lee for " songs and dances." The Queen appointed 
fasts on both these winters, the people went to church, 
and said they had " all gone astray like lost sheep, and 
there was no soundness in them," and some who heard 
believed that this was all true ; but it may be scrupled 
whether many priests u wept between the porch and 
the altar," or that many Jeremiahs' eyes ran down with 
water, " for the slain of the daughters of the people." 
That the people of England felt more deeply, and 
acted more consistently than did the people of Ireland, 
cannot be disputed. Ireland felt when her peace was 
disturbed and her ease was molested, and she cried 
loudly for help in this " God's famine," as she im- 
piously called it ; but ate her good dinners and drank 
her good wine, as long as she could find means to do 
so — famine or no famine ; her landlords strained for 
the last penny of rent, and sent their tenants houseless 
into the storm when they could pay no longer. 



164 ANNALS OF THE 

This, her sirs, her lords, and her esquires did. 
" No suspicion of embezzlement attached !" when a 
company of more than two thousand were intrusted 
with money at discretion, they must indeed have been 
a rare lump of honesty if some few glasses of wine had 
not been taken out of it, to drink the Queen's health 
on their days of festivals, or a pound now and then to 
pay off some vexatious debt, &c. And who shall tell 
Government of that? shall the United Fraternity 
themselves do it ? — shall the poor, who are powerless 
and unheeded, tell it 1 or shall " Common Fame," that 
random talking tell-tale, fly through the kingdom, and 
declare that Mr. , " head and ears in debt," sud- 
denly came out " clear as a horn," that Mr. Some- 
body was fitting up his house, and where did he get his 
money? and that the cattle and horses of Farmer 
G were getting fat and thriving astonishingly, &c. 

It was my fortune to be placed in a position among 
all classes, acting isolated as I did, to see the inner 
court of some of these temples — (not of the Commit- 
tees), with these my business ended when at Dublin. 
But I had boxes of clothing, and am obliged to ac- 
knowledge what common report says here, that the 
people of the higher classes in general showed a mean- 
ness bordering on dishonesty. When they saw a 
goodly garment, they not only appeared to covet, but 
they actually bantered, as though in a shop of second- 
hand articles, to get it as cheap as possible ; and most, 
if not all of such, would have taken these articles with- 
out any equivalent, though they knew they were the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 165 

property of the poor. Instead of saying, " These gar- 
ments are not fit for the cabin people, I will pay the 
full worth and let them have something that will do 
them good," they managed most adroitly to secure 
them for the smallest amount. These were people too 
who were not in want. The poor were shamefully de- 
frauded, where they had no redress and none to lift the 
voice in their favor. Among the suffering it was not 
so ; whenever I visited a neighborhood or a school, and 
clothed a naked child, or assisted a destitute family, 
those who were not relieved, never, in my presence or 
hearing, manifested the least jealousy, but on the con- 
trary, blessed God that He had sent relief to any one. 
This so affected me, in schools where I went, that a 
garment for a naked child was not presented in the 
school-room ; I could not well endure the ghastly smile 
of approbation that some child sitting near would give, 
who was nearly as destitute as the one that had been 
clothed. In one of Mr. Nangle's schools the teacher 
was requested to select the children most in want, and 
let me know, that I need not go into the room with new 
garments for a part, to the exclusion of others. These 
little suffering ones had not yet learnt to covet or envy 
— always oppressed, they bowed their necks patiently 
to the yoke. 



CHAPTER VI. 

" There is no god^ the oppressors say, 
To mete us out chastisement." 

POOR-HOUSES, TURNIPS, AND BLACK BREAD. 

These splendid monuments of Ireland^ poverty 
number no less than one hundred and thirty, and some 
contain a thousand, and some two thousand, and in 
cases of emergency they can heap a few hundreds 
more. Before the famine they were many of them 
quite interesting objects for a stranger to visit, gener- 
ally kept clean, not crowded, and the food sufficient. 
But when famine advanced, when funds decreased, 
when the doors were besieged by imploring applicants, 
who wanted a place to die, that they might be buried 
in a coffin, they were little else than charnel houses, 
while the living, shivering skeletons that squatted upon 
the floors, or stood with arms folded against the wall, 
half-clad, with hair uncombed, hands and face unwashed, 
added a horror if not terror to the sight. Westport 
Union had long been celebrated for its management, 
its want of comfort, in fire, food, lodging, and room ; 
but stay and die, or go out and die, was the choice. 
Making suitable allowances for a rainy day — the house 
undergoing some changes when I visited it — there then 



THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 167 

appeared little capital left for comfort, had the day- 
been sunny, and the house without any unusual up- 
turnings. The " yaller Indian," here, was the dread- 
ful thing that they told me, " swells us and takes the 
life of us ;" and as it was there cooked, it may be 
scrupled whether any officer in the establishment would 
select it for his food, though he assured the inmates 
" he could eat it, and it was quite good enough for a 
king." These officers and guardians, many of them, 
were men who had lived in ease, never accustomed to 
industry or self-denial, having the poor as vassals under 
them ; and when the potato blight took away all the 
means of getting rent, what with the increased taxa- 
tions and the drainings by a troop of beggars at the 
door, they found themselves approaching a difficult 
crisis, and to prop up every tottering wall new expedi- 
ents must be tried. Many of them sought posts of 
office under government, and were placed in the work- 
houses to superintend funds and food ; and it will not 
be slander to say, that the ears of government have not 
been so fortunate with regard to the " slip-shod " hon- 
esty of some of these gentry, as in the two thousand 
which the writer of the Crisis mentions. 

When the poor complained, they were told that 
funds were low, and stinted allowances must be dealt 
out. Nor did the mischief end here ; in proportion as 
the houses were crowded within, so were the purses 
drained without ; and beside, in proportion to the pur- 
loining of funds, so was the stinting of food and the 
extra drains upon the struggling tradesman and farmer. 



168 ANNALS OF THE 

An observer, who had no interest in the nation but 
philanthropy, going over Ireland, after traveling many 
a weary mile over bog and waste, where nothing 
but a scattering hamlet of loose stone, mud, or turf 
greets him, when he suddenly turns some corner, or 
ascends some hill, and sees in the distance, upon a 
pleasant elevation, a building of vast dimensions, taste- 
ful in architecture, surrounded with walls, like the 
castle or mansion of some lord, if he knew not Ireland's 
history, must suppose that some chief held his proud 
dominion over the surrounding country, and that his 
power must be so absolute that life and death hung on 
his lip ; and should he enter the gate, and find about 
its walls a company of ragged and tattered beings of all 
ages, from the man of gray hairs to the lad in his 
teens, sitting upon the ground, breaking stones with 
" might and main," and piling them in heaps — should 
he proceed to a contiguous yard, if the day be not 
rainy, and find some hundreds of the " weaker vessels," 
standing in groups or squatting upon their heels, with 
naked arms and feet — should he go over the long halls, 
and in some inclosure find a group of pale sickly-look- 
ing children cowering about a vast iron guard, to keep 
the scanty fire that might be struggling for life in the 
grate from doing harm — should he stop at the dinner 
hour, and see these hundreds, yes, thousands, march- 
ing in file to the tables, where was spread the yellow 
" stirabout," in tins and pans, measured and meted by 
ounces and pounds, suited to age and condition — and 
should he tarry till twilight drew her curtain, and see, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 169 

in due order, these men, women, and children led to 
their stalls for the night, where are pallets of straw, in 
long rooms (they are sorted and ranged according to 
sex) to lie down together, with neither light of the sun, 
moon, or candle, till the morning dawn, and call them 
again to their gruel or stirabout, to resume afresh the 
routine of the preceding day — would not this unin- 
formed stranger find all his opinions confirmed, that 
this must be the property of a monarch, who has gath- 
ered these hetereogeneous nondescripts from the pirates, 
highway robbers,, and pickpockets of his subjects, and 
had inclosed them here, awaiting the " fit out," for 
transportation ! 

But listen ! This honest inquirer is aroused by be- 
ing kindly informed that this great mammoth estab- 
lishment, with all its complicated paraphernalia of 
boilers, soup-pots, tins, pans, stools, forms, tables, and 
pallets, together with heavy-paid overseers, officers, 
matrons, and cooks, are all the work of Christian be- 
nevolence ! and that the building itself cost more than 
would a comfortable cottage and plot of ground suf- 
ficient to give each of the families here enclosed a good 
support. And further, so unbounded is the owner's 
benevolence, that over the Green Isle are scattered one 
hundred and twenty-nine more like palaces ! rearing 
their proud turrefs to the skies, furnished within with 
like apparatus, for tens of thousands, so that every 
Paddy, from Donegal to Kerry, and from Wicklow to 
Mayo, may here find a stool, a tin of stirabout, and 
pallet, on the simple condition of oathing that he owns 



170 ANNALS OF THE 

not either " hide or hoof," screed or scrawl, roattcck 
or spade, pot or churn, duck-pond, manure-heap, or 
potato-plot, on the ground that reared him, and simply- 
put his seal to this by pulling the roof from his own 
cabin. Should the inquirer be at a loss to conjecture 
how, when, and where this wide-spread philanthropy 
had a beginning, he is cited back to the good old days 
of Elizabeth and James, when the zealous Christian 
plunderer, Cromwell, prepared the way to parcel out 
the island, and entail it forever to a happy few, who 
found a race of people who would dig their ditches, 
build their walls, lay out their parks and ponds, for a 
penny or two a-day, and above all, could be made pa- 
tiently to feed on a single root, and live in mud cabins, 
or by the side of a rock, or burrow in sandbanks, who 
would " go at their command, and come at their bid- 
ding ;" and beside, for the unleased patch of ground, 
where they grew the root on which they subsisted, they 
paid such a rent as enabled the masters of the soil to 
live and fare sumptuously at home, to hunt the hare 
and deer over the mountain and glen, with lady, dog 
and gun, or to travel in distant lands. With all these 
appliances, they had lived on, sending care to the winds, 
till, from generation to generation, they found these 
" hewers of wood and drawers of water" had become 
so multifarious that, like Pharaoa's frogs, they en- 
compassed the whole land, covering bog and ditch, cry- 
ing, " give, give," till dinned and harassed with the 
undying clamor, they were moved to provide food and 
shelter in palaces of stone and mortar, where all care 



FAMINE IN IRELAND, 171 

of food, raiment, and lodging is at an end, and they 
have only to eat when they are fed, lie down when bid- 
den, rise and put on their clothes when the morning 
gives them light, and once a-week say their prayers in 
the church or chapel, as their conscience dictated, with- 
out leaving the proud roof where they are fed and 
housed ! 

These palaces certainly in this respect stand pre- 
eminent over every other portion of the earth, and tell 
the true story of Ireland's strange management more 
than volumes of essays would do. To pauperize men, 
women, and children, in sight of, and walking over a 
rich uncultivated soil, as is Ireland, and shut them up, 
with no other crimes than that of compulsory poverty, 
where they are fed, clothed, and lodged at the gover- 
nor's option, inclosed with bolts and bars, like felons, 
with no more freedom than state prisoners have, is cer- 
tainly a strange comment on liberty, a strange com- 
ment on the family relationship, which prohibits all 
intercourse between parents and children, except a few 
hasty moments one day in seven. The workhouses in 
Ireland are many of them well managed on the princi- 
ples as they are established ; but, as an overseer in 
one of the best conducted ones said, " I have been here 
many years, and have seen the workings and effects of 
a poorhouse, and can only say — the best that can be 
said of them — they are prisons under a different name, 
calculated to produce a principle of idleness, and to 
degrade, never to elevate, to deaden in the human 
heart that rational self-respect which individual sup- 



172 ANNALS OF THE 

port generates, and which should be kept up ; and may 
I never be doomed to die in a poorkouse." 

Nor is this all. The unreclaimed bogs and waste 
nunting grounds tell, that in no country are poor- 
houses such an anomaly as in Ireland ; and the Irish- 
man who is willing to work, and is employed there, has 
no moral right to be either grateful or satisfied that he 
has exchanged even a mud cabin of liberty for a palace 
walled and locked, where his food is measured and 
doled, where his family are strangers to him, and all 
the social interchanges of life are taken from him 
wholly. Though a man may be " a man for a' that," 
yet he cannot feel himself one ; nor does he seldom, 
if ever, regain that standard of manly independence 
which belongs to man, whatever his future lot may be. 

TURNIPS. 

As turnips made a prominent feature in the absence 
of their predecessors, the potatoes, during the famine, 
they should not be overlooked in the annals of that his- 
tory. They were to the starving ones supposed to be 
a " God-send," and were eaten with great avidity, 
both cooked and raw. Many of the cabiners could get 
but little fire, and they cooked only the tops, while the 
bottoms were taken raw ; those who had no shelter to 
cook under could not well eat the tops, though they 
often tried to do so. It has been ascertained that tur- 
nips contain but from ten to fifteen parts of nutriment 
to a hundred parts, thence the quantity necessary to 
nourish the body must require bulk to a great amount. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 173 

This root, when boiled, has ever been considered as 
safe a vegetable for the invalid as any in the vocabu- 
lary of esculents ; and even the fevered invalid, when 
prohibited all other vegetables, has been allowed to 
partake of this, not because of its nutrition, but because 
of the absence of it, not having sufficient to injure the 
weakest body. When it was found that turnips could 
be so easily grown, and that no blast had as yet in- 
jured them, they were hailed with great joy by the 
peasants and by the people. But the starving ones 
soon found they were unsatisfactory, for when they had 
eaten much more in bulk than of the potato they were 
still craving, and the result was, where for weeks they 
lived wholly on them, their stomachs were so swollen, 
especially children's, that it was a pitiable sight to see 
them. No one thought it was the turnip : but I found 
in every place on the coast where they were fed on 
them the same results, and as far as I could ascertain, 
such died in a few weeks, and the rational conclusion 
must be, that a single root, so innutritious and so 
watery as the white turnips are, cannot sustain a 
healthy state of the system, nor life itself for any con- 
siderable time. When going through the Barony of 
Erris, the appearance of these turnip-eaters became 
quite a dread. Invariably the same results appeared 
wherever used, and they became more to be dreaded, as 
it was feared the farmer would make them a substitute 
for the potato, and the ingenious landlord would find a 
happy expedient for his purse, if his tenants could live 
on the turnip as well as the potato. Like cattle these 



174 ANNALS OF THE 

poor creatures seemed to be driven from one herb and 
root to another, using nettles, turnip-tops, chickweed, 
in their turn, and dying at last on these miserable sub- 
stitutes. Many a child sitting in a muddy cabin has 
been interrogated, what she or he had eat, " nothing 
but the turnip, ma'am," sometimes the " turnip-top ;" 
and being asked when this was procured, sometimes 
the answer would be, " yesterday, lad}^" or, " when 
we can get them, ma'am." 

BLACK BREAD. 

We turn from the turnip and see what virtue there 
is in black bread ; and my only regret is, that my 
powers of description are so faint, that I cannot de- 
scribe one-half of what might be told of that novel 
article used for many a month in the county of Mayo. 
The relief officers there were under government pa} r , 
and, as they asserted, under government orders ; but it 
is much to be doubted whether the government, had 
they been served with a loaf of that bread, would have 
ordered it for either man or beast. The first that 
greeted my wondering eyes was in a poor village be- 
tween Achill and Newport, where, while stopping to 
feed the horse, a company of children who had been at 
school, and received a few ounces of this daily, came in 
with the boon in their hands. The woman of the 
house reached a piece to me, asking if I ever saw the 
like. Indeed, I never had, and had never tasted the 
like. Supposing it must have been accidental, and 
that no other of the kind had ever been made, I said, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 175 

" This is not such bread as the children usually eat." 
She answered, " They have had it for some weeks." 
It was sour, black, and of the consistency of liver ; 
but thinking that the baker had been mostly to blame, 
this bread did not make such an impression on me as 
that which I saw for weeks afterward. 

A few days after this, a gentleman, at whose house I 
stopped, brought into the room a loaf of the genuine 
" black bread." " Here," said he, " is the reward of 
a day's labor of a poor man, who has been sitting on 
the ground this cold day to break stones." Not one 
present could have told what it was, till taking it in the 
hand; and even then it was quite doubtful whether 
men would provide such a material to reward a laboring 
man for a day's work ; but it was indeed, so. The 
man who had come into possession of this boon was one 
among many, some of whom had walked three, four and 
even five miles, and had labored through a cold day in 
March without eating, and this bread weighed a pound. 
But the material and the color ! The material could 
not have been analyzed but by a chemist, but the color 
was precisely that of dry turf, so much so that when a 
piece was placed upon a table by the side of a bit of 
turf, no eye could detect the difference, and it was very 
difficult to do so when taking it in hand. The next 
day, calling on a gentleman of respectability and a 
friend to his country, he inquired if in my excursions T 
had met with the bread that the relief officers were 
giving the poor, adding, " I will procure you a piece." 
He then sent to the shop where it was kept and bought 



176 ANNALS OF THE 

a loaf; it was common unbolted flour-bread, of a mid- 
dling quality. He sent it back ; they denied having 
or selling any other kind to the poor, or ever having 
done so. " Go," said the gentlemen, " into the school 
where the bread is distributed, and then the facts will 
be palpable." I went. A school of one hundred and 
forty or one hundred and fifty girls were in waiting for 
this bread, which had been sent for to the shop. It 
came, was cut in slices, and having been baked that 
morning, the effluvia was fresh, and though standing at 
the extremity of a long room, with the street door open, 
the nausea became so offensive that after taking a slice 
for a pattern, and having ascertained from the teacher 
that this was the daily bread which she had been cutting 
for weeks, I hastened home with the prize, placed the 
bread upon paper where good air could reach it ; the 
disagreeable smell gradually subsided, but the bread 
retained all its appearance for weeks, never becoming 
sour, but small spots of a greenish color like mould 
here and there dotted upon it. These spots were not 
abundant : the remainder appeared precisely like turf- 
mould, and was judged to be so. 

Where these relief officers made out this article was 
not satisfactorily explained. '" They did as they were 
bidden." Report said that some twenty-nine years 
before, the government had deposited in that region 
some continental material for bread, which had become 
damaged, and then could not be sold. But twenty- 
nine years it had withstood the ravages of rats, mice 
and vermin, and had now come out an eatable com- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 177 

modity for charity. And here it was scattered daily 
through mountain and glen ; and for this equivalent the 
poor man must give up his land, take off the roof of 
his cabin with his own hand — for, as the government 
has not required this, the driver, like a slave one, ever 
faithful to his master's interest and good name, tells 
the starving cabiner if he will not ascend the roof of 
his hut and unthatch it, and tumble down the stones 
with his own hand, that he shall neither have the 
pound of meal or black bread. Then this driver 
screens himself behind the flimsy covering that the 
cabiner did it with his own hands, and the landlord 
gravely tells you that it was done without his orders, 
and probably without his knowledge. Slave-owners do 
precisely in the same way. They employ a faithful 
driver, pay him bountifully, and his duty is to get the 
most work done in the least time, and in the best way. 
If a delinquent be flogged to death, the owner is al- 
ways away from home or somehow engaged — entirely 
ignorant of the matter. But mark ! however often 
these cruelties may be repeated, the driver maintains 
his post and his salary. Are the public to be so duped 
in either case, that the slaveholder and landlord are not 
satisfied with this flogging and this pulling down of 
houses 1 Why, then, are they ever repeated 1 

The age of black bread and pulling down houses 
certainly has fallen peculiarly under the reign of the 
Queen and her agent John Russell ; yet it might be 
wholly unjust to impute either to their orders or even 
consent. The black bread was a cheap substitute for 
8* 



178 THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 

good flour or meal ; and if meddlesome people had 
staid at home, minding their own concerns, who would 
ever have thought of complaining about bread 1 The 
poor starving ones had reached that point that they 
would swallow anything in the shape of food that could 
have been swallowed, without uttering a murmur. 

A few pieces of this bread were put in a letter, di- 
rected to a friend in London, that the Committee there, 
acting for the poor in Ireland, might have a sight. 
The letter was carried to the postmaster, and an ex- 
planation given him of the precious gift contained in it, 
and the object of so doing, &c. ; that it was to let the 
people of England see if they acknowledged this article 
as a provision of theirs for the poor. The letter never 
reached its destination ; the postmaster was interrogat- 
ed by the writer ; he affirmed that he had seen no such 
letter, nor heard one word about it ; when lo ! this for- 
getful postmaster was one of the said relief officers who 
managed the black bread ! " Whoso readeth let him 
understand." 

Whether the poor lived or whether they died on this 
bread, or by this bread, I do not pretend to say, only 
that death was doing its work by hunger, fever, and 
dysentery continually. 



CHAPTER VII. 

"Earth, of man the bounteous mother, 
Feeds him still with corn and vine : 
He who best would aid a brother, 
Shares with him these gifts divine" 

Newport and its vicinity presented a variety of ex- 
citing scenes : here in this pretty town, families of tol- 
erable comfort declined step by step, till many who 
would have outlived the common changes of life could 
not maintain their standing in this hour of trial. A 
former rector, by the name of Wilson, died in the sum- 
mer of 184T, leaving a widow and four children on a 
pretty spot, where they had resided for years, and ga- 
thered the comforts of life about them. Here I was 
invited to spend a few weeks, and would with gratitude 
record the many favors shown me there ; and with 
deep sorrow would add, that I saw step by step all 
taken for taxes and rent ; everything that had life out 
of doors that could be sold at auction, was sold ; then 
everything of furniture, till beds and tables left the 
little cottage, and the mother was put in jail, and is 
now looking through its grates, while her children are 
struggling for bread. Sir Richard O'Donnell is the 
landlord in possession of most of the land there, and 
his " driver," like others akin to him, does strange 



180 ANNALS OF THE 

things to the tenants, quite unknown to the landlord, 
who has been called humane. 

But this fearless " driver " throws, or causes to be 
thrown down, cabin after cabin, and sometimes whole 
villages, of which it is said the landlord was entirely 
ignorant, but the pitiless storm heeded not that, and 
the poor starved exiles pleading that the cabin might 
be left a little longer, have no pity, their pot and even 
the cloak, which is the peasant woman's all by night 
and by day, has often been torn from her emaciated 
limbs, and sold at auction. Perhaps in no instance 
does the oppression of the poor, and the sighing of the 
needy come before the mind so vividly, as when going 
over the places made desolate by the famine, to see the 
tumbled cabins, with the poor hapless inmates, who had 
for years sat around their turf fire, and ate their potato 
together, now lingering and ofttimes wailing in despair, 
their ragged barefooted little ones clinging about them, 
one on the back of the weeping mother, and the father 
looking in silent despair, while a part of them are 
scraping among the rubbish to gather some little relic 
of mutual attachment — (for the poor, reader, have their 
tender remembrances) — then, in a flock, take their soli- 
tary, their pathless way to seek some rock or ditch, to 
encamp supperless for the night, without either cov- 
ering for the head or the feet, with not the remnant of 
a blanket to spread over them in the ditch, where they 
must crawl. Are these solitary cases 1 Happy would 
it be were it so ; but village upon village, and company 
after company have I seen ; and one magistrate who 



FAMINE IN IRELAND, 181 

was traveling informed me that at nightfall the pre- 
ceding day, he found a company who had gathered a 
few sticks and fastened them into the ditch, and spread 
over what miserable rags they could collect (for the 
rain was fast pouring) ; and under these more than two 
hundred men, women, and children, were to crawl for 
the night. He alighted from his car, and counted 
more than two hundred ; they had all that day been 
driven out, and not one pound of any kind of food was 
in the whole encampment ! 

When I went over desolate Err is, and saw the 
demolished cabins belonging to J. Walshe, I begged to 
know if all had died from that hamlet — " Worse than 
died," was the answer*; for if they are alive, they are 
in sandbanks on the bleak sea-shore, or crowded into 
some miserable cabin for a night or two, waiting for 
death ; they are lingering out the last hours of suffer- 
ing. Oh ! ye poor, ye miserable oppressors ! what will 
ye do, when the day of God's wrath shall come 1 
Have ye ever thought what " rock and mountain " ye 
can call upon to screen your naked heads, who would 
not here give the poor and hungry a shelter ? When 
" the elements shall melt with fervent heat ;" then 
shall the blaze of these ruins scorch and scathe you ; 
yea, burn you up, if you do not now make haste to re- 
pent. Ye lords, when the Lord of lords, and God of 
gods, shall gird on his sword ; then shall these poor be a 
swift witness against you. The widow and the father- 
less ye have delighted to oppress, because they could 
not resist you, and yet you dare to call yourselves by 



182 ANNALS OF THE 

the name of Him, whose mission was mercy, and who 
marks diligently the ways of him who delights in un- 
just gain, and is deaf to the cries of the widow and 
fatherless. Often, when looking at these wandering 
exiles, woful as is their case, yet my heart has said 
how much more woful is the case of him who drove 
you into the storm. Well might James say, " Go to, 
ye rich men, weep and howl;" and well did Christ 
pray — " Father forgive them, for they know not what 
they do." 

Contrasted with these were a few of better stamp, 
whose hearts had not become entirely seared by the 
love of gain. Mr. Pounding and his wife, who died by 
their excessive labors among the poor ; he was rector 
in Westport, and his money and time were faithfully 
employed in saving, and not destroying the poor. His 
name is now in sweet remembrance by those whom he 
succored in their time of need. It was pleasant, too, 
to see the laborers, whom Sir Richard employed in the 
cultivation of flax in the summer and autumn of 1847. 
Among the thousands which were happily at work, 
were many women, and their cheerful responses testi- 
fied how they prized the boon to be allowed to labor, 
when they could earn but a few pence a-day* This 
work ended, and with it many of the poor were left 
hopeless, and probably before another spring opened 
they were sent out into the storm, by the " driver" of 
this same Sir, who saw them work so willingly. 

Mr. Gildea, too, had a fine establishment for spin- 
ning and weaving. Here are employed about seven 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 183 

hundred, mostly women, spinning and hand-skutching, 
and their earnings were three shillings and three shil- 
lings and sixpence per week. The yarn was spun by 
hand, and the weaving by a spring shuttle. The table- 
linen and sheeting would compete with any manufac- 
tory in any country. Yet this valuable establishment 
was doing its last work for want of encouragement — 
want of funds ; and machinery is doing the work faster 
and selling cheaper, though the material is not so dur- 
able. What can the poor laborer do ; willing to work 
at any price, and begging to do so, yet cannot be al- 
lowed the privilege. Mr. Gildea kept a number em- 
ployed, and employed to a good purpose, many of whom 
may at last starve for food. 

The state of the famine here might be illustrated by 
a few facts which came under my observation. The 
chapel bell tolled one morning early, when a respectable 
young woman was brought into the yard for interment. 
No bells tolled for the starving, they must have the 
" burial of an ass," or none at all. A young lad im 
proved this opportunity while the gate was open, and 
carried in a large sack on his back, which contained 
two brothers, one seventeen, the other a little boy, who 
had died by starvation. In one corner he dug, with 
his own emaciated feeble hands, a grave, and put them 
in, uncoffined, and covered them, While the clods were 
falling upon the coffin of the respectable young woman. 
I never witnessed a more stirring striking contrast be- 
tween civilized and savage life — Christianity and hea- 
thenism — wealth and poverty, than in this instance ; it 



184 ANNALS OF THE 

said so much for the mockery of death, with all its 
trappings and ceremonies — the mockery of pompous 
funerals, and their black retinue. This poor hoy un- 
heeded had staid in the dark cabin with those dead 
brothers, not even getting admittance into the gate, till 
some respectable one should want a burial ; then he 
might follow this procession at a suitable distance, 
with two dead brothers upon his back, and put them 
in with his own hands, with none to compassionate him ! 
A cabin was seen closed one day a little out of the 
town, when a man had the curiosity to open it, and in 
a dark corner he found a family of the father, mother, 
and two children, lying in close compact. The father 
was considerably decomposed ; the mother, it appeared, 
had died last, and probably fastened the door, which 
was always the custom when all hope was extinguished, 
to get into the darkest corner and die, where passers- 
by could not see them. Such family scenes were quite 
common, and the cabin was generally pulled down upon 
them for a grave. The man called, begging me to 
look in. I did not, and could not endure, as the famine 
progressed, such sights, as well as at the first, they were 
•too real, and these realities became a dread. In all 
my former walks over the island, by day or night, no 
shrinking or fear of danger ever retarded in the least 
my progress? but now, the horror of meeting living 
walking ghosts, or stumbling upon the dead in my path 
at night, inclined me to keep within when necessity did 
not call. The entire face of the country was changed, 
for though poverty always was brooding her dismal 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 185 

wings over that island, yet now she had sharpened her 
teeth, and in many parts desperation was driving the 
people to deeds which had long slept, or which never 
before had been transacted. A class of persons, driven 
to madness by idleness and hunger, were prowling at 
night through some parts of the country, calling them- 
selves " Molly Maguires." These go from house to 
house, in disguise, demanding money, and if denied, 
they card the refuser till the skin becomes lacerated ; 
this scratching is performed sometimes with a card and 
sometimes with the whin-bush 5 which is full of small 
thorns, but these thorns, when applied to the skin, take 
leave of the bush, and remain there, so that the sufferer 
must often continue days before he can rid himself of 
these troublesome comrades. Many of these marauders 
have been apprehended, yet the practice did not cease, 
because they were encouraged by the country people, 
who had cattle in the pounds which had been seized for 
taxes, and these expert gentry, for a small reward, lib- 
erated and restored the animals to the original owners. 
A good supper of the best bread, butter, milk, and 
fowls, which the farmer could supply, ended the even- 
ing's jollity. White-boys, Peep-o'-day boys, Lady 
Clares, and Molly Maguires, are hereditary entail- 
ments, having existed ever since parceling out the land 
so unjustly, as a reward of plunder, was done to a few. 
Uncultivated as the mind of the Irish peasantry may 
be, it is not inactive — the pool is not stagnant — life of 
some kind will sparkle up ; and truly, if ever oppres- 
sion was justifiable in making wise men " mad," it is 



186 ANNALS OF THE 

in Ireland. When the cup is full it will flow over ; — 
and the saying, that Ireland " must have a rebellion 
every forty or fifty years," has a law of nature for its 
foundation. The grand river that supplies the mighty 
" Niagara," flows quietly on for many a mile, till it 
reaches a certain point, when it takes a rapidity, gath- 
ering force as it proceeds, till it meets the fearful pre- 
cipice down which it has roared and tumbled for ages, 
and down which it will roar and tumble till nature her- 
self shall be dissolved. 

The so-called " Rebellion " of 1848, which sadly 
sealed the fate of Mitchell and O'Brien, was precisely 
this law. They had waited and suffered, suffered and 
waited, till they reached the awful chasm — the famine. 
They had seen it swallow its thousands, and they saw 
and felt that this chasm might have been closed ; they 
looked on, they agitated, till their philanthropic love of 
country and deep sense of justice rushed into a tempo- 
rary madness, rashness, and an insanity which hurled 
them headlong into their present abyss. The Tippe- 
rary men, who congregated on that hill, with their 
flocks and herds, gave a rational reply to the priest, 
who exhorted them to disperse, rational — for unculti- 
vated barbarians, as their enemies call them. 

The priest pointed them to the absurdity, the rash- 
ness of rising against so formidable an enemy as Eng- 
land and her soldiers stationed in the country. " Bet- 
ter suffer than fight, and fight for nothing, too." They 
added, " It isn't the likes of us, yer riverence, that 
looks for the right, or the Repale, but the long winter 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 187 

of the famine will be on us, and we shall die with hun- 
ger ; the blackguard taxes will take all the cattle, and 
we took 'em here, plaise your riverence, to ate, and let 
the soldiers shoot us, and that will be the quick death 
for us ; better than the long hunger, your riverence — 
better than the hunger." Now,, that was certainly, 
for " barbarians," quite a civilized, if not philosophical 
answer, and quite in keeping with Irish coolness in dif- 
ficulty and danger. It was something like a company 
from a district in the south of Ireland, in the time of 
the first winter of the famine. They had given up all 
hope of life, and consulted to go in company to the 
poorhouse, and die there, that they might be buried in 
coffins. Such a haggard array of misery had never 
been seen before in one body, and the soldiers were or- 
dered to be on the spot at the workhouse to keep all in 
safety. These despairing creatures paused before the 
red coats and guns, and implored them to shoot them 
down, and end their long misery at once. This was no 
false bravado. They were sincere, and not one among 
them, it is believed, would have shrunk in the face of 
that death. 

This rebellion, it should be told, was not that un- 
grateful affair as has been represented. It was not 
agitated, or scarcely known, among the thousands who 
had been charitably fed in the famine. It originated 
among the higher classes of w T ell-fed politicians, who 
were too enlightened not to know T the causes of their 
country's sufferings, and too humane to look on with 
indifference. They were seconded by a lower class of 



188 ANNALS OF THE 

men, who had not as yet felt the whole force of the 
famine in their own stomachs, but knew it must speedi- 
ly come upon them. " Give us death by the bullet," 
they said, " and not the starvation." All this should 
be taken into consideration ; and beside, this rebellion 
had nothing to do with the sectarian spirit of the coun- 
try. Protestants were at the head of it, and many of 
the Catholics chimed in, but the priests, as a body, 
stood aloof, and expostulated with their people to do 
the same. The O'Connells were loud against it, in 
word and action ; and had the Catholics as a body 
united their forces, Ireland would have been one vast 
field of blood. 

CROY LODGE AND BALLINA. 

Through the romantic snow-topped mountains of 
Doughhill, a son of Mrs. Wilson conducted me on her 
car to Ballycroy, or Croy Lodge, the cottage on a most 
wild coast, where Maxwell wrote his " Wild Sports of 
the West." We wound among mountains of the most 
lofty kind ; and hanging over the sea, reflecting their 
snowy sides from its molten surface, with a bright 
morning sun shining upon them, they were strangely 
beautiful. The panorama was exceedingly interesting, 
and the more so that the peasants appeared better fed 
than any I had met in the countiy. The relief-officers 
here might be more attentive, seeing that this destitute 
spot so inclosed could yield no possible relief. 

Stopping to feed the pony, a woman entered, whom 
we had passed an hour before, with a little girl peep- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 189 

ing out from under a cloak upon her back. She told 
us she had been at Mulrone the day before, in hopes of 
getting a little meal, and was disappointed ; it was not 
the day that the relief was given out. They were pen- 
niless, and had not eaten since the day before, and the 
walk was nine miles. Having in my reticule a sweet 
biscuit, it was given to the pretty and clean hungry 
child. She took it, and gave me a " God bless } T e, 
lady," but could not be prevailed to eat it ; she wrap- 
ped it in her pinafore most carefully, looked up to her 
mother and smiled, but would not break it. " How is 
this V I asked the mother ; " she cannot be hungry." 
" She is indeed hungry, but she never saw such a thing 
before, and she cannot think of parting with it, hungr} r 
as she must be." Such self-denial in a child was quite 
beyond my comprehension, but so inured are these peo- 
ple to want, that their endurance and self-control are 
almost beyond belief. Giving her a piece of bread, 
she ate it with the greatest zest — she had seen bread 
before. 

We took her upon the car, and for three miles she 
rode under my cloak, with her biscuit snugly wrapped 
in her apron, holding it most carefully between her 
hands ; and when we set her down, at the turn of the 
road and I saw her little bare feet running away, and 
heard her last word of " bless ye, lady," with the pre- 
cious treasure safely secured, I prayed the Savior that 
he would take that little lamb of his flock^ and shelter 
her in his bosom from the bleak winds of adversity, that 
are so keenly blowing and withering the cheek of many 



190 



ANNALS OF THE 



a fair blossom in that stricken country. Some days 
after the mother found me, and said the biscuit was 
preserved, " to remember the nice lady !" How little 
does it take to make such poor happy ! The country 
was bleak and barren, and a cordial welcome to Croy 
Lodge after dark was a pleasant salutation. Here, 
shut in from wind and cold by a bright turf fire, clean 
cloth, and good dinner, had there been none starving 
without, the evening would have been a pleasant one. 
Ballacroy had suffered much, but it was not Belmullet. 
That ghastly look and frightful stare had not eaten out 
all the appearance of life and hope which many mani- 
fested. A visit to the national school gave not a very 
favorable impression of the state of the children ; 
nearly a hundred pale-faced and bare-footed little ones 
were crowded into a cold room, squatting upon their 
feet, cowering closely together, waiting for ten ounces 
of bread, which was all their support, but now and then 
a straggling turnip-top. The teacher, with a salary of 
XI 2 a year, could not be expected to be of the nicer 
sort, nor of the highest attainments in education. The 
improvement of the children would not in some time fit 
them for a class in college. 

From this university I went to a hunting-lodge kept 
by Mr. Wilson, accompanied by the kind teacher, who 
insisted that a watch-dog, kept by the gentleman for 
the purpose of guarding the premises, would " ate me" 
if I went alone. Assuring him that the dogs in Ire- 
land had always treated me with great urbanity, and 
that I feared no harm, he would not allow it; the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 191 

" blackguard," he added, " will rend ye ;" and he 
kindly conducted me to the door. The dog growled ; 
speaking kindly to him, he led me through the hall, 
and when I was. seated, doglike, he put his amicable 
nose upon my lap. The master approvingly said, 
" That dog, madam, is very cross and even dangerous 
to any ragged person or beggar that approaches . the 
premises ; but when one decently clothed enters, he 
welcomes them as he has done you." So much for the 
training of dogs, and their aptness in acquiring the 
spirit of their masters. 

Never before, in Ireland, had so good an opportunity- 
been presented me of becoming acquainted with the 
trade of a real sportsman, its merits and demerits, as 
now ; and knowing that the occupation had been in 
the country quite a celebrated one, I hoped here to 
learn its real advantages. 

Mr. Wilson was keeping the lodge for Mr. Vernon, 
of Clontorf Castle, near Dublin, to hunt and fowl as 
he best could. " I am dying," he said, " with rheu- 
matic pains, brought on by wading through the bogs in 
pursuit of the hare and wild fowl." He had a noble 
company of dogs, terriers and pointers, and was sur- 
rounded with all the respectable insignia of a hunter of 
olden time. " It is a frivolous employment," he ob- 
served, " and I have long been sick of gaming." The 
room was hung round with all sorts of game which is 
taken by these gentry ; and his little daughter of four 
years of age brought me a book containing pictures of 
hares, foxes, fowls and dogs, and quite scientifically 



192 ANNALS OF THE 

explained the manner of taking them, the tact of the 
scenters, and the duty of the pointers, so that I was 
initiated into the first principles of this fashionable 
trade ; she could read intelligibly, and when I commit- 
ted an error in the pronunciation Or understanding of 
the maneuvers of leaping ditches and following dogs, 
she set me right, wondering at my dullness, and some- 
times rebuking it. This child had superior talents, 
and had the mother who cultivated them the spirit of 
Timothy's mother and grandmother, she might and 
would be capable of much use in her age. Her father 
said she had a great taste for the tactics of hunting 
and fowling, and had acquired her knowledge of read- 
ing so young by the fondness of studying the pictures 
and spelling out the names of the games. Perverted 
knowledge ! and when carried to the extent that some 
who call themselves ladies in Ireland have done, and 
practiced with that zest that many have manifested, it 
becomes a romantic mania, quite in keeping with the 
mountain squaw of the American forest, whose undaunt- 
ed prowess and athletic exercises give her a manliness 
of look and manner which would not disgrace a Spar- 
tan. 

An opportunity of improving upon the lessons my 
young teacher had given me, afterward offered itself in 
the person of a lady, whose talents at this pursuit had 
been cultivated to a high extent. She would on a cold 
morning jump upon her favorite hunting-horse, capa- 
risoned in true hunter's style, her ready attendants, 
hounds, pointers and terriers in advance or pursuit, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 193 

and gallop at full speed, till some scenter should get 
upon the track ; then hedge and ditch, valley and hill, 
were scarcely heeded. The sure-footed horse knew his 
duty, and no circuitous route was taken ; if a hedge 
intervened, it was leaped or broken through ; if bog or 
slough sunk him mid-deep, her cap and feather were 
soon seen tossing " high and dry" above all mire and 
danger, pursuing still faster as excitement grew warm- 
er, till the lucky dogs gave signal that the object was 
secured ; then the delight, the ecstasy, of seeing the 
palpitating victim in its agonies, in the power of her 
faithful pets ; and thus the live-long day the sport 
continued. At night she returned, with the dogs, 
game, and companion of her chase, who was sometimes 
her father, who had delighted from her childhood to 
cultivate this fondness in his daughter ; sometimes it 
might be a brother, and sometimes a generous party 
would compose the company. But the coming home, 
the sit-down for the recital of the pleasures of the day, 
if the victim were a hare, this was a valuable equiva- 
lent ; the manner of its flight, its narrow escapes, its 
terror, was so delightful to witness, when the dogs 
were close upon it, and then the dying, all would be 
minutely described, the dogs would be gathered and ca- 
ressed, each by his pet name. A good dinner around 
the family table was served to each, and two or three 
of the largest always slept in a bed with some members 
of the family. The most exquisite tenderness was 
manifested lest the dear creatures should suffer cold or 
hunger. Yet this tender-hearted Miss, who could not 




194 ANNALS OF THE 

suffer an unkind word to fall upon the ear of her favor- 
ite pointer, would go into raptures of delight at the 
agonies of the timid hare. Her features seemed to 
have acquired a sharpness, her expression a wildness, 
her skin a brownness, and her whole appearance was 
like a true hunter, living and enjoying the constant 
pursuit. 

There is a kind of enchantment, a witchery, hung 
round an open air exercise like this, which the more it 
is practiced the more it is loved, till all that tends to 
elevate the mind, and cultivate the best principles of 
the heart are effaced ; and it is quite doubtful whether 
the subject of this false pursuit can ever become truly 
and substantially a valuable member of society. 

But Croy Lodge must not be forgotten. In and 
around it, upon the exciting sea-shore, was much that 
would have given delight, had all been as plentiful 
about every hearth and table as was around the one at 
which I was sitting. The first Sabbath after my ar- 
rival, a written invitation from an officer of the coast- 
guard was sent us to attend church service across the 
strand in his watchhouse. An open boat conveyed the 
family and myself to the thatched station-house, where 
in tasteful array were arranged officers, and all the in- 
struments for killing, hanging in glistening order upon 
the walls, while in the midst of this embryo battle-field 
the young curate from Belmullet read his prayers and 
sermon in a most becoming manner ; and we returned 
in company with Mr. Hamilton, the coast-guard officer, 
who closed the evening by reading and prayer. A 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 195 

Sabbath of singular mixture — boating, prayers, and 
warlike paraphernalia, all in the same breath ; by min- 
isters, officers, and hunters, all believing and practicing 
these different professions. Religion is strangely stir- 
red up in Ireland, it makes a kind of hodge-podge in 
everything, and is marked with little or no distinction 
in anything. 

Monday, a visit to Doona across the strand, intro- 
duced me to some curiosities. The tide was ebbing, 
and for a quarter of a mile before reaching the castle 
we were to visit, we saw stumps of large trees, which 
centuries ago must have been a rich grove, though not 
a tree at present is anywhere on the coast, and the sea 
now occupies the entire lawn, where these once stood. 
The family residing near the castle are of respectable 
lineage, by the name of Daly, and in true Irish ancient 
style set before us meat, bread, and potatoes, the last 
the greatest compliment that could be paid to a guest. 
The castle, Maxwell says, was built by Granauile ; but 
not so, its whole structure is so different, its walls so 
much thicker than any in the days of Grana's reign, 
that its date must have been centuries before. Its 
history has an incident which will render it a lasting 
name. 

Not a century ago, the christening of a farmer's 
child was in progress one night in a house near by — the 
waiting-boy was sent to get a fresh supply of turf — he 
dropped his torch of bogwood among the dry heap, 
which was piled in the castle, which so heated the 
walls that they crackled and tumbled, and in their fall 



196 ANNALS OF THE 

set fire to a multitude of casks of contraband spirits. 
The explosion so frightened the jolly inmates, that 
they fled in dreadful terror from the ruins, and they 
now stand as that night's festival left them, giving the 
solitaiy advantage of showing the thickness of the walls, 
and the curious construction of a building, whose true 
origin has not been certainly defined. Once, it was a 
spot of proud grandeur ; now a heap of desolation 
marks the whole for many a mile, where gardens and 
groves once were planted. 

Wednesday morning, at five, I took a car for Ban- 
gor, met the mail-coach, and went through a cold, 
dreary country for twenty miles, to Crossmolina. A 
little cultivation and a few trees tell the traveler that 
the town is near. Six miles further we reached the 
hospitable house of Peter Kelly, mentioned in these 
pages — and surely no character is better deserved than 
is his for that excellent trait ; and the kindness I re- 
ceived under his roof never can be forgotten. Such 
families should live in the records of history as pleas- 
ant mementoes for the grateful, and examples for the 
parsimonious, that if such can be taught, they may 
have the benefit of using hospitality without grudging. 
The cheerful sacrifices made in the house, that I might 
not only stay, but be made comfortable, were so in con- 
trast with the pinching and squeezing which often is 
met in families of the " would-be-thought hospitable," 
that surely it might be said, that he descended from a 
generous stock, as instinct not cultivation seemed en- 
tirely the spring of action in him. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 



197 



The remembrance of Ballina is " sweet and pleasant 
to the soul." That " Codnach of gentle flood," the 
sweet river Moyne, that flows quietly and richly 
through the green meadows there, must leave pleasant 
associations in the minds of all lovers of nature who 
have wandered upon its banks. Though it was in the 
dark days of the famine, in the dreary month of Febru- 
ary, that I entered Ballina, yet everything looked as if 
men and women of good taste and good feeling dwelt 
there. It was here that the indefatigable Kincaid la- 
bored and died, in the year 1847. His simple tablet 
hangs in the church where he preached ; but he needed 
no marble monument, for his name will be held in ever- 
lasting remembrance. " He w T as eyes to the blind, and 
the cause he knew not he sought out." Free from 
sectarianism, he relieved all in his power, and spoke 
kindly to the bowed down ; he wiped the tear from the 
eye of the widow and fatherless, and brought joy and 
gladness into the abodes of those who were " forgotten 
by their neighbors." He had a co-worker in his la- 
bors of love, who died a little before the famine, in the 
person of Captain Short. He had been a naval officer ; 
but by the grace of God had become a follower of the 
meek and lowly Jesus, and devoted his time, talents, 
and wealth, to the cause of God and his fellow-crea- 
tures. In their lives, these two, like Jonathan and 
David, were united ; and in their deaths they were not 
long divided. Mr. Kincaid, who was but thirty-five, 
left a widow, and son and daughter. The widow is 
worthy to bear his name. She too, like him, is found 



198 ANNALS OF THE 

among the poor, promoting their temporal and spiritual 
good in every possible way. In her are united much 
that makes woman appear in that dignified light, that 
tells for what she is intended, and what she might be, 
if kept from the trammels of a false education, and 
early brought into the covenant of grace. 

I met the widow of Captain Short in the wilds of 
Erris, and- her name and remembrance were pleasant 
to my heart. In her house in Ballina I passed happy 
hours. She entered feelingly into my object in visiting 
Ireland, and it is but just to say, that though not one 
pound was then at my command to give in charity, yet 
had thousands been in my possession to bestow, I could 
not have wished more kindness than was manifested to 
me then. Their courtesy seemed to be of the genuine 
kind flowing from the heart. The town has a popula- 
tion of ten thousand inhabitants, Episcopalians, Bap- 
tists, Presbyterians, Methodists, and Roman Catholics ; 
the latter claiming the majority. The ladies here were 
much interested for the poor ; a society for spinning 
and knitting was in operation, and the eagerness of the 
women to procure work was affectingly manifested on 
the day of meeting, when crowds would be waiting in 
the hall, some falling upon their knees, begging for 
spinning to be given them, when the most that spinners 
could earn would be eightpence a week. Those who 
prepared the flax by hackeling could earn from eighteen - 
pence to two shillings a week. So far have manufac- 
tures cheapened this work, that the ladies who give it 
lose at that low price. The distress of Ballina was in- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 199 

creasing, the poor-law system is impoverishing all the 
middle classes, who must become paupers, if not beg- 
gars, unless their taxes are reduced. No complaint 
was made in this place of the partiality or neglect of 
relieving officers, all seemed to bless the hand that fed 
them ; and however rebellious the Connaught peoplo 
may be, no indications were here given of insurrection. 

The Baptist minister, who is a missionary, stationed 
there, with his praiseworthy wife and children, has 
been an instrument of doing much good. Without 
being a proselyter, he had gathered a church counting 
nearly a hundred, chiefly from the Romish population ; 
his humble chapel stands open, the seats free ; and 
passers-by often step in from curiosity, and stay from 
inclination, till their hearts become impressed with the 
truth, and they are finally led to unite in building up a 
church which they once supposed was heresy. The 
character of this missionary may be told in a few words 
which a lady in the Protestant church uttered, in an- 
swer to — " Who is the most active laborer in town 
among the poor V a Mr. Hamilton does the most 
good with the least noise, of any man among us." 

A respectable banking-house -is established in the 
town, at the head of which is an Englishman ; his 
active wife is an Irish lady. They are friends to Ire- 
land, and not blind to the causes of its evils. 

It has been remarked, that most of the English who 
reside in Ireland become quite attached to both country 
and people, prejudices being blunted by nearer ac- 
quaintance. The six weeks of pleasant acquaintance 



200 ANNALS OF THE 

there cultivated, must be exchanged for different scenes. 
This old seat of kings, with its raths, stones of memo- 
rial, green meadows, gentle flowing Moyne, and abbeys, 
but above all the people, courteous in manner, and 
kind in action, must be left forever. 

The last day of February, 1848, will be remembered 
as one that took me reluctantly away from a town and 
people peculiarly endeared to my heart. I was not 
coldly hurried away to a coach alone, leaving the family 
in bed who had taken their farewell the evening before ; 
Miss O'Dowda, Miss Fox, and two little daughters of 
Peter Kelly accompanied me, and as the high-mettled 
horse galloped and hurried us away, I looked a sad 
and tearful adieu. The sun was bright, the meadows 
on the banks of the Moyne were green, and the ride 
full of interest. The same sun was shining, the same 
river flowing — but where were the proud kings with 
their shields of gold and vv-arlike bearing that once held 
their sway over this pretty landscape 1 Dead, dead ! 
some moss-covered stone in a crumbling castle or abbey 
tells their demise, and the children of the mountains 
heedlessly trample on the monument. The children, 
yes, the children of Ireland, cling to my heart beyond 
and over all else, and when fond remembrance turns to 
Baiiina, the courteous, well-disciplined, affectionate 
children of Peter Kelly, sometimes make me regret 
that I ever had seen them, because I shall see them no 
more. The Irish, both in high life and low, are a pat- 
tern to all Christian nations in the early training of 
their children. No visitor has cause to dread the cla- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 201 

mor, in a house, or the confusion and breaking up of 
all that is comfortable and quiet at table in an Irish 
family. They are not first at table — first and best 
served — monopolizing all attention to their own pam~ 
pered palates — selecting the most palatable food, &c, 
but seldom are they present with guests, and if so, 
their demeanor in most cases is an honor to the gov- 
erness and mother who has disciplined them. We 
soon found ourselves on the borders of the celebrated 
Ponton Lakes ; but who shall describe them 1 " Why," 
said one in Ballina, " among all the tourists who have 
visited Ireland, have none more particularly described 
these lakes, and the whole scenery ?" For this plain 
reason, description must here fail. There is so much 
in such varied confusion and beauty, that nothing is 
particularly marked ; the eye is lost in the view as a 
whole. Before the famine, I was whirled one cold day 
over the one-arched bridge by a surly coachman, who, 
in answer to my inquiries of the picturesque scenery, 
said, " That it was a divil of a starved rocky place, 
and he was glad when he saw the end on't." The 
lakes on this sunny day had the finest opportunity to 
set off their transparency ; and for many miles they 
glistened, widening and narrowing, bordered by all 
manner of fantastic rocks and heath, till we reached 
the Ponton Bridge, which passes over a narrow neck, 
connecting the two lakes. These lakes are called Cul- 
len and Coma. The current flows different ways in 
the course of the day, as Lough Cullen has no vent but 
to discharge its overflowing waters into the larger lake. 



202 ANNALS OF THE 

Lord Lucan has built an hotel, police barracks, and a 
few cottages, under the wooded rocks which overlook 
Lough Cullen ; but all seem quite deserted under Cum- 
mer mountain, having only a care-taker to tell its pedi- 
gree. The rocks are thrown together upon one side, in 
masses, as if ready to fall asunder ; some lying at the 
foot of cliffs, as if precipitated from them, and one of 
immense weight is poised upon a summit, by a small 
point, which to the passer-by appears as if jostling 
ready to fall ; and we were told that a skein of silk 
could be drawn between the two rocks. We took the 
road from the lower lake to the left, and followed the 
tortuous ravine till we reached a small one-arched 
bridge, opposite which is a most picturesque barren 
island, covered with heath, and a black rock, which 
contrast beautifully with the blue water of the lake ; 
the wooded hillocks, bordering the lakes with varied 
foot-paths, give the visitor all the advantages of pleas- 
ant views from their elevation upon the bold expanse, 
and the rocky shore upon the other side. 

In its moss-covered rocks, and richly wooded hills, 
Ponton resembles Glengariffe, but it wants the curling 
smoke between the rocks, and the tree-tops, ascending 
from turf cabins, and here and there a flaxen-headed 
urchin upon the top of the thatch to make the whole 
picture. We wound along, meeting now and then a 
sudden peep, through trees, on the path which leads 
three miles farther to the once tasteful domain of Mr. 
Anderson, which afterward I visited with Mrs. Bourke, 
and found the mansion desolate, the walks grown up 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 203 

with weeds ; and all the ancient grandeur, which once 
was here displayed, reminds one of the old blasted 
fortunes of a hunter, who had exhausted his wine-casks, 
drunk the last health, and sounded the last horn over 
these broad lakes, and now tattered and slip-shod, was 
recounting his hunting valor in some shebeen house, 
where whisky, pipes, and song enliven the present, and 
put out all light of the past. The declining sun 
warned my friends that they must return ; leaving me 
to walk, or sit upon a stone, while waiting for the coach 
that was to take me to Castlebar. I saw the last wave 
of the hands of the kind young ladies and flirting of 
the handkerchiefs of the little Kellys, as they whirled 
around the point which took me from their sight. It 
was not a mawkish sentimentality that made me feel 
like giving up the coming lonely hours to an indulgence 
of weeping. I was alone, in a land of strangers, amid 
famine, pestilence, and death, going I scarcely knew 
where, and could not expect to find another Ballina 
before me ; and the last few weeks served to heighten 
the contrast of what had been suffered, and what must 
rationally be expected to await me. The coach came, 
and shut me in, and no more was seen till Castlebar 
was reached. Here was a town that had tasted deeply 
the cup of woe ; she had a splendid poorhouse, and it 
lacked no inmates, yet the streets were filled with beg- 
gars. Many beautiful scats of respectable families are 
about the town, some in tolerable vigor, and some giv- 
ing the last look upon former grandeur. Some inter- 
esting facts are recorded of this old assize town. 



204 ANNALS OF THE 

Many trees have borne on their limbs the bodies of 
miserable culprits ; and now the more genteel drop ef- 
fects the same work in a different way. 

March 14th. — Criminal cases were going forward 
now in court, and the attorneys, Dublin-like, had come 
prepared with wigs and gowns, for the first time, a 
practice heretofore not in vogue in Connaught. The 
ladies in Castlebar were curious to behold this novel 
sight, but custom had prohibited them hitherto from 
appearing in these places. Two prisoners were to be 
tried for murder ; and wishing to know how Ireland, 
which has been somewhat celebrated for trials of this 
kind, managed such cases, in company with a young 
lady of the family, I went ; we found a favorable posi- 
tion in the gallery, where we could see the court and 
prisoners. The case was this : — A publican had be- 
come offended with a neighbor, and determined to be 
revenged, by giving him a good beating. Not wishing 
to do it himself, he called in two men, gave them an 
abundance of whisky, and for a few shillings they 
agreed to do it well. The man was waylaid at night- 
fall, and the beating went on ; many joined in the af- 
fray, some to rescue, and some to assist. The man was 
killed. The evidence went to prove that one of the 
two gave a heavier blow, and he must have finished the 
work, consequently he was guilty. The attorney, 
Bourke, made a most able defence, and though a Ro- 
man Catholic, he dwelt most solemnly on the last grand 
Assize, when that court, as well as the prisoners at the 
bar, must be judged by an impartial Judge, and con- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 205 

demned or acquitted, as their real state should be 
found. The judge was celebrated for clemency, and 
gave a plain impressive charge, that if the least doubt 
remained on their minds, they must lean to the side of 
mercy. 

What must have been the conflicting emotions of the 
miserable men, when that jury retired! They both 
stood coolly, as is the peculiar habit of that impetuous, 
hasty people, in the face of danger or death ; and the 
jury soon returned with a verdict of guilty for one. 
What a fallible tribunal is man ! How could a jury 
decide, in a riot like that, who was the murderer, and 
how could they decide that either intended murder 1 
It appeared a haphazard jump to get rid of the case. 
In the evening, I was in the company of three of the 
jury, and spoke of the responsibility of being a juror, 
where life and death are concerned. One most exult- 
ingly responded, that he " liked the responsibility well, 
and should be glad to have it in his power to hang 
every murderer he could catch ; they deserved no mer- 
cy, and he would never show any." A second one con- 
firmed it, and all manifested that lightness that was 
horrid for men who had just condemned a fellow-crea- 
ture to the gallows. It is hoped these jurymen were 
not a common specimen of the class in Ireland ; if so, 
life must hang more on the prejudices and retaliating 
propensities of a jury, than on the evidence or merits 
of the case. The poor man was reprieved, and trans- 
ported for life. The inhabitants had strenuously ex- 
erted themselves in his behalf, knowing that the publi- 



20G ANNALS OF THE 

can was the instigator, and whisky the instrument, of 
the murders. This " good creature " certainly has 
some marks in his forehead that look like the " beast." 
Patrick's-day was opened with a little apprehension 
on the part of the people throughout the country. 
u Conciliation Hall " had given an invitation to all 
parts, for the people to assemble that day, and send a 
united and earnest appeal to government for a redress 
of grievances and Repeal of the Union, holding up 
France as an encouragement for action. The deplor- 
able state of the country, the loss of confidence in land- 
lords, and the abatement of the influence of the priests, 
left something to fear, that when so many should be as- 
sembled, the irascible temper of the nation would be 
stirred up to dangerous acts. In Castlebar, the people 
collected had mass ; the priests exhorted them to be 
quiet ; and in the evening the principal houses were 
illuminated. Boys assembled, lit up a tar-barrel, drew 
it through the streets, shouting, " Hurra for the Re- 
public," while men walked soberly on, more as if fol- 
lowing a hearse than if stimulating their countrymen to 
deeds of valor, or rejoicing at conquest. The mirth of 
the land has emphatically ceased, the spirit is broken ; 
every effort at conviviality appears as if making a last 
struggle for life. The shamrock was sprinkled here 
and there upon a hat, but, like its wearer, seemed 
drooping, as being conscious that its bloom was scathed 
and its beauty dying forever. The deep disease in 
this body politic has never been thoroughly probed, 
and the evil lies where probably it has been least sus- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 207 

pectcd. The habits of the higher classes for centuries 
have had little tendency to enlighten or moralize the 
lower order, and yet, when all is taken into considera- 
tion, drinking habits included, the scale must prepon- 
derate in favor of the latter. 

Some respectable families in and about Castlebar 
were doing to their utmost for the poor. Mr. Stoney, 
the rector, was employing many of them, in spinning, 
but so isolated were these efforts, that little could be 
done to stay the plague. Two miles from Castlebar I 
spent a Sabbath in the family of the widow Fitzgerald, 
relict of a British officer, who was an English lady 
from the Isle of Wight, much attached to Ireland. 
Though the mother of a numerous family, she draws, 
paints, and plays on the piano, as in the days of her 
youth. Her spacious drawing-rooms are hung around 
with elegant specimens of her taste in painting ; and 
then seventy-three years of age she appeared to have 
lost none of the vigor of intellect which she must have 
possessed in her youth. A son-in-law, a meek be- 
liever, the Protestant curate of the parish, was resid- 
ing with her, and the whole constituted a family of 
love and peace, and of the kindest feeling toward the 
poor. 

An unexpected invitation to visit the parish of Par- 
tra, by the active Catholic curate, who resided there, 
was accepted. " You will find him," a Protestant 
gentleman remarked, " an active, honorable man 
among the poor, and one who has done much good." 
The country about him scarcely had a parallel, even in 



208 ANNALS OF THE 

Skibbereen. Eleven miles from Castlebar opened a 
bright spot of taste — a glebe-house and tidy new chapel, 
which this indefatigable curate had built, in spite of all 
poverty. In the chapel were a few half-dead children 
huddled upon the floor, some around the altar, with 
their writing-books upon the steps for desks, without 
table or benches. These the curate had gathered 
among the starving, for the sake of the black bread, 
which kept them barely alive. The neighborhood 
abounds in novelties, strange and romantic, but most of 
them must be passed over, to leave room for details of 
the people. This indefatigable man had caused a fever 
shed to be erected, on a bog bordering upon the Lake 
of Musk, where pure air is circulating, and a snug 
cottage stands near, in which the matron who keeps the 
hospital resides. Thirty invalids were here, mostly 
sick from the effects of hunger, with swollen legs, many 
of them past all hope. Far away from any inhabitant, 
this hospital, cottage, and their inmates stood, strug- 
gling to keep up the dying flame of life, only to suffer 
fresh and hopeless troubles. Solitary as this region 
everywhere is, it was once celebrated ground. That 
day's excursion to me was full of strange scenes and 
strange anecdotes. Here stood the stone raised in 
memory of the death of John, the " priest killer ;" 
here is the site of an ancient abbey, but twelve feet 
wide ; here, on the borders of the lake, is an anvil be- 
longing to a forge, which is of such weight that it has 
never been raised from the bed into which it has sunk, 
and where it is supposed to have lain for centuries. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 209 

An iron ore-bed is near the spot, as useless as all ma- 
terials for improvement are in Ireland. 

This parish borders on the famous Joyce country, and 
is replete with interest, where in days of yore robbers 
and murderers sported at will. A noted robber, by 
the name of Mitchell, was taken in a house pointed 
out, now in a crumbling state, but then occupied by a 
landlord who entertained the mountain robber, and had 
even bargained away his daughter to this desperado. 
A handsome reward was offered to secure this fearful 
prowler, and the landlord, in spite of family relation 
or treaty, determined to make sure the prize. One 
night, when Mitchell, overcome with a mountain ex- 
cursion of plunder, had gone to sleep with his pistols 
near him, the landlord wetted the pans, went out and 
took in the magistrates to Mitchell's bed, who was still 
asleep, but soon awaked — seized his pistols — they re- 
fused to act. He was secured, bound, and finally ex- 
ecuted. 

On the route this day, among all the rarities, was 
the christening of an infant in a miserable dark cabin 
by this priest, which he assured me was the only 
birth he had known for months. May I never see 
the like again ! The dark mud cabin — the straw on 
which the mother lay — the haggard countenances of the 
starving group — the wooden bowl of " holy water" — 
the plate of salt — the mummery of the priest, while 
he was putting the salt of grace to its lips, the blowing 
with his breath to infuse the regenerating spirit into 
the soul, were such a trifling, fearful combination of 



210 ANNALS OF THE 

nonsense and profanity to my dark mind, that it was 
quite difficult to keep a usual degree of sobriety, but the 
priest escaped with no other lecture than an exclama- 
tion of nonsense, when we were out of the cabin. To 
do these poor priests justice, they have labored long 
and hard since the famine, and have suffered intensely. 
They have the most trying difficulties to encounter, 
without the least remuneration. In the best of times, 
their stipulated sum is but ten pounds a year, the re- 
mainder must be made up by " hook and by crook." 
Weddings and christenings formerly gave what the ge- 
nerosity of guests could bestow, which was always so 
small, that a Protestant lady once, from pure benevo- 
lence, attended one of these cabin-weddings in the poor 
parts of the country, and put four pounds into the plate 
as it was passed round. She said the priest was a peace- 
able citizen, very poor and very kind, and why should 
she not give this, which she could spare, and he need- 
ed. In the famine, night and day, their services were 
requisite, no fevers nor loathsome dens, nor even caves 
could exonerate them, they must go whenever called, 
and this without any remuneration. One day's excur- 
sion will better illustrate this" fact, than general remarks 
can. I went to a spot on purpose to see for myself, 
and that day asked the priest to show me the most that 
he could of the realities of the famine, and soon I was 
gratified : the sight was too much, and in a few hours 
my way was made back in the rain over the fearful 
waste alone to the glebe-house. We were soon met by 
applicants of all description begging on their knees, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 211 

clinging fast to the poor man, begging for God's sake 
that he would give them letters to the relieving officer 
for the pound of meal, asking advice how and what to 
do, when they had pulled down their cabins and had no 
shelter ; the rain was falling, the roads bad, and the 
multitude so increased as we proceeded that it was 
very difficult to make our way. He told them, they 
must let me pass decently as a stranger, who had come 
out to see them through pity, and kindly added, " You 
know I would relieve you, but cannot." Not one im- 
patient word ever escaped him through the whole, al- 
though their unreasonable importunities were dreadfully 
tormenting. I had heard so many relieving officers and 
distributors scold and threaten, and had struggled so 
hard myself to keep patient without always succeed- 
ing, that I inquired how he kept without scolding. His 
answer was, " Sure, as I can give them no money, I 
should give them kind words." Here were cabins 
torn down in heaps, and here were the poor wretched 
starving women and children, crawling together by the 
side of ditches, or in some cabin still standing, to get 
shelter from the rain, scattered too, over a wide extent 
of country. " What shall I do V said the despairing 
priest ; "let me die rather than witness daily such 
scenes as I cannot relieve." I left him to go farther 
into the mountains, where some of the dying had sent 
for him, and ascended a little eminence alone, and saw 
the smoke of the humble abode of the parish priest, 
by the name of Ward, and all without and within gave 
proof, that if he had lived for gain, he had missed the 



212 ANNALS OF THE 

road thither. He was a simple-minded priest of the 
old school of Ireland, and had added no new-fangled 
notions of modern style, and welcomed me to his house 
like an old patriarch of four thousand years ago ; the 
poor found in him a friend whose warm heart and open 
hand always were ready to give, so long as he had any- 
thing to bestow. Thirteen hundred of his parishioners 
had died in Partra of the famine in twelve months, out 
of a population of six thousand. I returned home with 
benediction added to blessing upon my head, for hav- 
ing come to visit so poor and so neglected a people as 
his in those desolate mountains. The curate did not 
reach home till late in the evening drenched with rain ; 
he had left without shelter a dying man, with his wife 
and daughter standing by, and giving them the last six- 
pence, he had returned, for he could do nothing more. 
At the dawning of day the daughter stood at his win- 
dow, saying her father was dead, and begged that he 
would go and do something to assist in putting him 
away from the dogs ! 

Thursday, April 13th. — A drive to Balinrobe pre- 
sented a beautiful variety of scener}^. Lake Carra is 
spread out, dotted with islands, and indented by penin- 
sulas, with a long bridge across it, called Keel, inferior 
to none but Ponton, three miles from the glebe, and we 
were in sight of the tall steeple of the chapel, towering 
presumptuously for so unpopular a religion ; for time 
was when the Romish church was not allowed steeples 
of any dimensions, and they now make no great preten- 
sions in the steeple way. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 213 

The town of Balinrobe is somewhat picturesque, and 
was once the assize town of Mayo ; but the judges saw 
fit to remove it to Castlebar ; and report says, that 
some trifling complaint concerning bakers and cooks 
was the cause ; but the town still boasts a famous 
poorhouse, well filled, a proud barrack, with a noble 
supply of the fighting gentry, placed there, as we are 
told, to make up for the removal of the assizes. A 
beautiful river, bordered with trees, winds through the 
town, occasionally a pretty cottage peeping between 
them, with two ivy-covered ancient ruins, among tomb- 
stones and naked skulls, with inscriptions of such an- 
cient date, that time had worn them so that they were 
almost entirely defaced. 

An invitation to dine at Dr. Rafe's, introduced me 
to a lady, in Mrs. Rafe, who might justly be classed 
among intellects and attainments of the highest order ; 
I had seen many well-bred ladies in Connaught, but 
not one who was better acquainted with books, and 
who could converse on something beyond small talk 
with greater facility and understanding than Mrs. 
Rafe. 

From Balinrobe, the famous Cong w r as visited, known 
as containing so many natural curiosities and ancient 
historical events. The abbey here is one of great in- 
terest, large, and designed with exquisite carvings, and 
beautiful arches of doors and windows. The niches 
are entirely filled with bones. Here is interred the 
famous Roderic O'Connor, among the neglected rub- 
bish ; and priests and people in one confused mass, 



214 ANNALS OF THE 

mingling their dust among peasants and beggars. But 
the beauty of Cong is, that ordained by nature ; the 
river, and green meadow, and hillock, where stands a 
most enchanting lodge, backed with wood, which is 
seen with great advantage from the top of a hill upon 
the opposite side, which every tourist should be mind- 
ful to ascend. 

The lake, the town, the church standing in the walls 
of the old abbey, the river, lodge, and wood in front, a 
promonotory of the brightest green ; and, as a finish, 
the pier, containing some of the choicest stones of the 
abbey carved with hieroglyphics, give to the whole pic- 
ture a view beautiful and novel in the extreme. The 
" Horse Discovery," is a chasm into which a horse 
plunged when plowing. The chasm is now descended 
by artificial stone steps, and standing upon the bottom, 
the water is seen sparkling far back and murmuring at 
your feet in darkness. Spars are hanging from the 
roof, and the aperture above is fringed with vines and 
ivy, giving a somber look to the whole. 

The " Lady's Buttery," comes next ; this is a shelv- 
ing rock, covered with grass and shrubbery, under 
which flows the river Al, somewhat rapidly, and is lost 
in the lake some quarter of a mile below. 

The " Pigeon Hole " is the lion of Cong ; it is so 
called because pigeons are wont to make nests in the 
dome. This hole is descended by forty-two stone steps, 
quite steep, and at the bottom is the river that runs 
through the " Buttery," flowing most cheerfully here, 
and forming a little eddy in which fish are sporting. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 215 

These caused great excitement among the troop that 
had followed us, a legend being told, that the fish in 
this pool had lived there ever since its discovery, with- 
out multiplying or decreasing ; these patriarchs conse- 
quently are of very ancient date ; and a young lad told 
us that one of these fathers had been caught, and put 
upon a gridiron to broil, but made his escape into the 
water, and has now the marks upon his ribs, so that 
from age to age he has been traced ; but he can never 
be caught, nor can any of his comrades be induced to 
nibble a bait. The fish had not been seen for a long 
time, and the company and curate were highly rejoiced 
that these black gentlemen should come out to salute 
us. The river after passing this eddy flows rapidly 
through a fearful cavern, arched over with black stones, 
many of which seem to have tumbled down, and lay 
piled along through the dark chamber ; an old woman, 
for many a year, had been the keeper of this cavern, 
and with a bundle of dried rushes lighted, she led the 
visitors on, showing a lofty ceiling of stone, cut in the 
most fantastical shapes. The fearful slippery passage, 
over slimy and uneven rocks tumbled and piled to- 
gether, the music of the water hastening away to hide 
itself under the earth again, the grand dome of black 
stone, and the graceful curtains of the ivy hanging and 
swinging at ease, all lighted up by the glaring torch, 
made an underground picture sublime, terrific, and 
beautiful in the extreme. This profitable estate is 
now in possession of the granddaughter of the lately 
deceased inheritor ; and the elasticity of the young 



216 ANNALS OF THE 

damsel testified to her full confidence in her own pow- 
ers, as well as hopes of a fortune in the end. The en- 
virons of Cong contain a quantity of black stone which 
is much used in building, covering the ground in layers, 
through the fields about the town. 

A dinner was in waiting at Dr. Rafe's, and no one 
could have thought, when looking upon the table, 
that famine was raging without. On a beautiful site 
at Balinrobe, this indefatigable priest has leased a 
piece of thirty acres of land, at one shilling per acre, 
where he intends building a monastery for nuns and 
children of the poor. A curious stone stands upon the 
spot, and no manuscript has yet told its pedigree ; but 
its lofty upright bearing says it is of noble origin. 

The industry of this curate appears, if not super- 
natural, urged on by an irresistible impulse, almost un- 
paralleled. Shall it be credited, that in thirteen weeks 
he converted a barren spot into a fine site for a chapel 
and glebe-house. After demolishing the old chapel, he 
built and finished them both in excellent taste. The 
wall, which surrounds a large handsome lawn before 
the house, is built of stone, which was quarried in one 
day, and the whole completed in three hours. The 
entire parish were invited to the chapel to hear mass 
at nine o'clock ; then all were encouraged with having 
music and amusement to their hearts' content when 
the work should be finished. Eight hundred assembled. 
The curate assigned a certain portion to be erected by 
so many, and thus confusion was prevented — the work 
went orderly on. And this three hours' labor com- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 217 

pleted a wall inclosing the chapel and glebe-house, 
fringed upon the top in front with a peculiar kind of 
stone from the lake, which is jagged, porous, and black, 
and when struck, gives a sound like iron. The wall is 
whitewashed, the stones upon the top left black, adding 
an air of ornament to the whole. A young shrubbery 
is already looking up in the door-yard, giving to the lately 
barren waste bog an appearance " like a young garden, 
fresh and green." 

These people, called Roman Catholics, certainly 
must astonish the Orthodox world bj r their untiring zeal 
for the good of the church in Ireland. With every- 
thing to oppose, they urge on their way ; a govern- 
ment church forcing upon them restrictive laws very 
severe, and a laboring class of real paupers ; with these 
drawbacks they build chapels, finish them well, and 
" through evil and through good report," nakedness and 
famine, they urge their way, erecting chapels in the 
midst almost of hetacombs of the slain ! The curate was 
asked where he got money for all this ; " Money was 
not wanted," was the answer. Seventy carts were in 
train drawing the stone when cut from the quarry. 
The stone was free — labor was free — and< every parish- 
ioner performed his part cheerfully. The little money 
that was required for the trimmings the bishop sup- 
plied. The coarse trite saying of John Bunyan's im- 
prisonment may be fitly applied to the government 
church in Ireland. A writer remarks, that " the devil 
run himself out in his own shoes when he put John 
Bun} r an in jail." 

10 



218 ANNALS OF THE 

The curate shall be dismissed after one more allu- 
sion to his ever-awake zeal in all and everything. The 
poorhouse in Balinrobe did not exactly suit his notions 
of justice to the inmates. He called upon the guard- 
ians and apprised them that a fearless scrutinizing 
friend to the poor, from the United States, was visiting 
all the " soup-shops " and " workhouses " in Ireland, 
and was " showing up " the dishonesty practiced among 
them, by taking notes, which were printed for the in- 
formation of government. Not suspecting that my 
name had gone before, in the innocence of my heart my 
way was made thither, and I was happily disappointed 
at finding the house in such excellent order, officers and 
servants w T ere all at their posts, and everything done to 
make the visit most agreeable, yet there was such an 
appearance of affectation in the whole that thoughts did 
arise whether in reality all was so. The purloining of 
the public benefactions since the famine, has given so 
much cause for suspicion, that all whose hands are not 
thoroughly clean, shrink from observation. 

The guardians of the poor in Ireland will have a sad 
account to render at the last, in many cases, it is great- 
ly to be feared. Feeding the poor on two scanty meals 
of miserable food, when there are funds sufficient, has 
been the accusation which has proved too true in many 
parts, and has operated so powerfully upon the inmates, 
that when once out they have chosen death out-of-doors 
rather than going in again. 

I found some few hungry men on my way putting a 
few potatoes in a field, and inquired why they should 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 219 

lose their potatoes and their time in this hopeless un- 
dertaking q . The answer was, " Plaise God we'll have 
the potato again." The " potato again," is the last 
wreck to which they are still clinging. 

April 17th. — With a sister of Peter Kelly, I went 
to " Old Head," and was first introduced into one of 
the dreadful pauper schools, where ninety children re- 
ceived a piece of black bread once a-day. It was a 
sad sight, most of them were in a state of rags, bare- 
footed, and squatted on the floor, waiting for a few 
ounces of bread, with but here and there a fragment of 
a book. The clean schoolmaster, on a cold day, was 
clad in a white vest and linen pantaloons, making the 
last effort to appear respectable, laboring for the re- 
muneration of a penny a week from each family, if by 
chance the family could furnish it. These ninety all 
belonged to Mrs. Garvey's tenantry, and there were 
others looking on who had come in likewise, not be- 
longing to her lands, who wishfully stood by, without 
receiving one morsel. I looked till my satiated eyes 
turned away at a pitiful sight like this. Neither the 
neat cottage, the old sea, nor my favorite Croagh Pat- 
rick, could give satisfaction in a wilderness of woe like 
this. When will these dreadful scenes find an end % 

Naught but desolation and death reigned ; and the 
voice of nature, which was always so pleasant on the 
sea-coast, now, united with the whistling of the wind, 
seemed only to be howling in sad response to the moans 
and entreaties of the starving around me. The " holy 
well," where the inimitable drawing of the blind girl 



220 ANNALS OF THE 

was taken, is near this place. In years gone by this 
well was a frequented spot, where invalids went to be 
healed. It is now surrounded by stone, covered with 
earth, and a path about gives the trodden impress of 
many a knee, where the postulant goes round seven 
times, repeating a " Paternoster " at every revolution, 
and drops a stone, which tells that the duty is per- 
formed. A hole is shown in a stone, where the holy 
St. Patrick knelt till he wore the stone away. A poor 
peasant girl, in the simplicity of her heart, explained 
all the ceremonies of the devotees and virtues of the 
well, regretting that the priests had forbidden the prac- 
tice now. A company soon entered the church-yard 
and set down a white coffin, waiting till the widow of 
the deceased should bring a spade to open the grave ; 
and while the dirt was being taken away she sat down, 
leaning upon the coffin, setting up the Irish wail in the 
most pathetic manner ; she, by snatches, rehearsed his 
good qualities, then burst into a gush of tears, then 
commenced in Irish, as the meager English has no 
words to express the height of grief, madness, or joy. 
The ground was opened but a few inches when the cof- 
fin of another was touched. The grave-yards are 
everywhere filled so near the surface that dogs have 
access, and some parts of the body are often exposed. 

A debate was now in progress respecting good works 
and the importance of being baptized into the true 
church. Mrs. G., who professed to be a papist, dis- 
puted the ground with them, till the contest became so 
sharp that I retired, for their darkness was painful ; it 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 221 

seemed like the valley and shadow of death, temporally 
and spiritually. 

The little town of Louisburgh, two miles from " Old 
Head," had suffered extremely. An active priest and 
faithful Protestant curate were doing their utmost to 
mitigate the suffering, which was like throwing dust in 
the wind ; lost, lost forever — the work of death goes 
on, and what is repaired to-day is broken down to- 
morrow. Many have fallen under their labors. The 
graves of the Protestant curate and his wife were 
pointed out to me in the church-yard, who had fallen 
since the famine, in the excess of their labor ; and the 
present curate and his praiseworthy wife, unless they 
have supernatural strength, cannot long keep up the 
dreadful struggle. He employed as many laborers as 
he could pay, at fourpence a-day, and at four o'clock, 
these " lazy " ones would often be waiting at his gate 
to go to their work. He was one day found dining 
with the priest, and the thing was so novel, that I ex- 
pressed a pleasant surprise, when he answered, " I 
have consulted no one's opinion respecting the propriety 
of my doing so ; I found," he added, " on coming here, 
this man a warm-hearted friend to the poor, doing all the 
good in his power, without any regard to party, and de- 
termined to treat him as a neighbor and friend, and have 
as yet seen no cause to regret it." This same priest 
was not able to walk, having been sick, but he was con- 
veyed in a carriage to Mrs. Garvey's, and most cour- 
teously thanked me for coming into that miserable 
neighborhood, and offered to provide some one, at his 



222 ANNALS OF THE 

own expense, to convey me into the Killeiy mountains, 
to see the inimitable scenery, and the "wretched inhab- 
itants that dwell there. In company with the wife of 
the curate, and the physician, I went there. The 
morning was unusually sunny, but the horrors of that 
day were inferior to none ever witnessed. The road 
was rough, and we constantly were meeting pale, mea- 
ger-looking men, who were on their way from the moun- 
tains to break stones, and pile them mountain-high, for 
the paltry compensation of a pound of meal a-day ; 
these men had put all their seed into the ground, and if 
they gave up their cabins, they must leave the crop for 
the landlord to reap, while they must be in a poorhouse 
or in the open air. This appeared to be the last bitter 
drug in Ireland's cup of woe ! " Why," a poor man 
was asked, whom we met dragging sea-weed to put 
upon his potato field, " do you do this, when you tell us 
you expect to go into the poorhouse, and leave your 
crop to another V " I put it on, hoping that God Al- 
mighty will send me the work to get a bit." 

We met flocks of wretched children going to school 
for the " bit of bread," some crying with hunger, and 
some begging to get in without the penny which was 
required for their tuition. The poor little emaciated 
creatures went weeping away, one saying he had been 
" looking for the penny all day yesterday, and could 
not get it." The doctor who accompanied us returned 
to report to the priest the cruelty of the relieving offi- 
cer and teacher, but this neither frightened or softened 
these hard hearts. These people are shut in by moun- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 



99; 



tains and the sea on one side, and roads passable only 
on foot by the other, having no bridges, and the paths 
entirely lost in some places among the stones. We 
left our carriage, and walked as we could ; and though 
we met multitudes in the last stages of suffering, yet 
not one through that day asked charity, and in one case 
the common hospitality showed itself, by offering us 
milk when we asked for water. This day I saw enough, 
and my heart was sick — sick. The next morning, the 
Protestant curate wished me to go early to the field, 
and see the willing laborers in his employ. He called 
one to the hedge, and asked if he had the potatoes in 
his pocket which he had gathered some days ago. The 
man took out a handful of small ones. " These," said 
the curate (the tear starting to his eye), " are what this 
man found in spading up the ground here ; and so little 
have his family to eat at home, that he has carried 
them in his pocket, till he can find some little spot 
where he may plant them, lest if he should leave them 
in the cabin, they would be eaten." This man had 
a family of four to support on the fourpence earned in 
that field. 

One interesting and last excursion ended my painful 
visit in this romantic desolate region. The company 
was made up of Mrs. Garvey, a cousin of hers of the 
same name, a widow who possessed land in these vales 
and mountains for four miles, and her two sons. The 
distance was eight miles, the road narrow, winding, 
rocky, and in some places entirely lost, excepting the 
foot-path of the shepherds. Our vehicle was a cart 



224 ANNALS OF THE 

with a bed in it for the accommodation of the two 
ladies, who had never like me been jolted on this wise, 
and were now submitting to all this hardship for my 
amusement. With much fixing and re-fixing, order- 
ing and re-ordering, bed, baskets of lunch, extra cloaks, 
and so on, all adjusted, we were "well under way " 
for these " Alps on Alps." We had not made more 
than two miles of this journey, when stones, brooks, 
and no road said " Ye can go no further." We did, 
by getting out and lifting the cart, and at length found 
ourselves in a flat vale with a pretty river flowing 
through it. Scattered here and there were the once 
comfortable cabins of the tenants of the last-named 
Mrs. G., now every cabin either deserted or suffering 
in silent hopelessness, and all the land lying waste. 

The poor cabiners would meet us, and say to their 
landlady, " God bless ye, and once ye didn't see us 
so, but now we are all destrawcd." " And how, Mary 
or Bridget, do you get on 1 — have you any meal 1 — and 
I am sorry that I couldn't send you any more," &c, 
were the salutations of this kind landlady, who had 
not received one pound of rent since the famine. I 
thanked her most gratefully for the favor she bestowed 
on me in keeping from nry ears those heart-scathing 
words to the starving poor I had heard so much from 
landlords and relieving officers during the famine. " I 
could not upbraid them," she answered, " for until the 
famine, scarcely a pound of rent has been lost by them 
all ; and my only sorrow is, that I can do nothing to 
keep them alive, and not lose them from the land." 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 225 

Four miles took us to the foot of a pile of " Alps," at 
the bottom of which was sleeping a sweet lake, cra- 
dling in its bosom a little green shrubbery island, the 
habitation of wild fowl entirely. The precipitous 
rocky path made it impossible to use the cart, and our 
crushed clumsy feet were now put in requisition. 
Though our walk was a rugged one, yet we were not 
losers ; for Ireland, above all other countries probably, 
should be visited in this way, having two superior ad- 
vantages. First, there is so much of the romantic 
reality to be seen everywhere, both in antiquities and 
nature ; and second, the courtesy of the peasants, 
which makes every rough place easy ; and if they have 
not milk to offer you, the purest water that ever spark- 
led in fountain or well is springing up everywhere to 
refresh the traveler. We had nature to-day in her 
full dress, and besides the pleasure of seeing that 
heartfelt welcome which was manifested toward the 
"blessed landlady," I contrasted it with a walk taken 
one sunny day with a rich landlord, a few months before, 
whose tenants were all " lazy dogs ;" he had tried 
them twenty-five years and could make nothing out of 
them, and now they were starving they were all look- 
ing to him, &c. These tenants, when they saw us ap- 
proaching, walked away without any recognition ; or if 
in close contact, they gave a slight touch of the hat, 
with no welcome, nor " blessed landlord." " Your 
tenants, sir," I observed, " clo not appear so hearty 
and courteous as is customary for the mountain peas- 
ant? in many places." " T told you I could never 
10* 



226 ANNALS OF THE 

make anything out of them, and intend clearing the 
whole land another year and get a better set." The 
landlady this day was pointing me from cabin to cabin, 
where lived an industrious man or tidy woman, and 
" I must lose them all." Proud mountain rose, in 
conical form upon mountain, as if by some volcano 
they had been shot up perpendicularly ; streamlets 
were trickling from their sides, and the rich heath and 
sedge covered their surface. These lofty piles give 
pasturage to cattle, sheep, and goats, and we saw the 
faithful shepherd's dog leaping from rock to rock, gath- 
ering the flock to drive them to better forage, and the 
little shepherd-girl sitting upon a crag to watch the 
little charge ; and under the mountain was nestlld the 
cabin of the herder, who for twenty years, he told us, 
had guarded the flocks upon the tops and sides of these 
lofty mountains. By the wayside was a large fold, in- 
to which all the sheep are gathered when the different 
owners wish to ascertain if any are missing, or when 
any are wanted for use. The owner and not the shep- 
herd sustains the loss, if the number be wanting. The 
sheep live and thrive upon these rich mountains, sum- 
mer and winter. The mountain-goat, so peculiarly 
adapted for climbing the crags, we saw here ; his 
shaggy mane waving in the breeze, as he nibbled the 
sedge and heath upon the highest peaks. Our road 
was upon a fearfully precipitous side of a hill, hanging 
over the lake. We had reascended the cart, and were 
obliged again to leave it, and the chubby Mrs. Garvey, 
in doing so, like a sack of wool, made a summerset and 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 227 

rolled upon rough stones ; her justifiable shrieks were 
echoed by our hearty O dears ! for we expected to see 
her mangled arms, body and legs, making their fearful 
tumble into the lake below. When we saw her peep 
out from under her mutilated bonnet, and found that 
life was still in her, though she insisted that she was 
dead, quite dead ! my uncourteous laughing powers had 
no alternative but to drop into a dead, grave silence, 
which was more uncourteous still ; for united with that 
natural abstractedness into which my mind always 
drops when in the midst of nature's grand scenery, my 
appearance amounted to a state of sullenness. We 
hobbled down the hill, leading our unfortunate tumbler, 
right glad that she was not actually broken in pieces by 
the fall, though certainly she was not benefited by it 
for the day. We reached a little flat lawn by the side 
of the lake, took our " pic nic," and commenced new 
difficulties : a stream must be crossed — there was nei- 
ther bridge nor stepping-stone, nor could the cart assist 
us. We wandered to and fro — at last, taking the 
clothing from our feet, we waded over slippery stones 
and gained the shore, not far from the Aclelphi Lodge. 
Its whereabouts we knew by the evergreens that adorned 
the mountains. We wound round a path Yfhich showed 
us on the right a conical heath mountain, lost in the 
skies; and no sooner had we passed that than one on - 
the left, as though broken from its side, rose in view. 
Thus we proceeded, threading our way by the side of a 
pretty stream, till we saw the cottage, built by Lord 



228 ANNALS OF THE 

Sligo, now in possession of the Plunkets, three brothers, 
who named it Adelphi. 

A river winds round the domain, which connects the 
sea on the left with the lake on the right, a mountain 
of the grandest and boldest stands in front of the cot- 
tage, without a tree, presenting a most beautiful pic- 
ture of light and shade ; the sides being spotted with a 
yellow appearance mixed with the heath and sedge, re- 
conciling the eye to the absence of the tree. At the 
back of the lodge stands another like mountain ; form- 
ing, in unison, with everything around, a scenery dis- 
tinct from any other in Ireland. It was once the re- 
sort of the gay, where resounded the bugle and hunter's 
horn : its lakes, its rivers, its mountains, gardens, cas- 
cades, and walks, now appear as if the struggling gar- 
dener was trimming here and there a festoon, and fast- 
ening a decaying plant anew to some supporting stalk, 
that he might keep alive a relic or two of its former 
loveliness ; but alas ! the beauty of Ireland is depart- 
ing, her gay ones are becoming sad ; the cruel sport of 
the hunter which once was the delight of the fashion- 
able has ceased, and the timid hare may now trip and 
leap among the brakes and ferns, without starting at 
the bark of the fearful packhound in pursuit. The 
setting sun, as it warned us to depart, gave such an 
enchanting look to the dark mountains hanging over the 
lake and pretty river, that I could not but 

" Cast a longing, lingering look behind/' 

There was a fearful eight miles in advance ; the stream 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 229 

must be waded, the precipitous footpath hanging over 
the lake at nightfall was before us ; but so completely 
abstracted had I become, that if no company had been 
there to have urged me forward, the moonlight, if not 
the morning, might have found me sitting, looking alter- 
nately at the mountains and lakes. We made our way 
through the defile, and reaching a little hamlet, a soli- 
tary man came to meet us, and welcomed me in true 
Irish style to his country, adding, " in a twelvemonth I 
hope to be in your country." A young son had gone 
two years before, and sent him back <£19 for the voyage. 
" I am leaving," said he, " praise God, a good land- 
lady, who can do no more for us, and we can do noth- 
ing for her." " This man," said Mrs. Garvey, " is 
one of my best tenants, and I am lost by parting with 
him, but cannot ask him to stop." 

This romantic tour ended in the evening, and I 
stopped with the " good landlady " over the night, and 
arose while all were asleep in the morning, and scoured 
through the pretty wood that fringed the river, and 
back of the house, and selected the choicest moss- 
clotted stones, both great and small, for a rockery ; and 
when the laborers had arisen, they assisted in carrying 
and wheeling them upon the lawn which fronted the 
cottage and bordered the stream, and around a solitary 
young fir standing there, we placed these stones. The 
daisy and primrose were in bloom — these were dug and 
planted in the niches, while the landlady added her 
skill in setting the young plants, when, in three hours — 
the same time that the wall of the Partra Priest was 



230 ANNALS OF THE 

in building — there was a rockery of firm finish, bloom- 
ing with the young flowers of spring. This was my 
last work in the county of Mayo, and frivolous as it 
might be, it was so in accordance with the ancient cus- 
toms of Ireland, and my own feelings too, that when I 
turned from it forever, I said, " Stand there, when the 
hand that raised you shall be among the dead ; and 
say to the inquiring traveler who may visit this spot, 
that Asenath Nicholson, of New York, raised these 
stones, as a memento of the suffering country she so 
much pitied and loved, and as a monument of grati- 
tude to the God who had conducted her safely through 
all the dangerous scenes encountered while passing 
over it." 

A branch of the Garvey family lives near Murrisk 
Abbey, situated on Clew Bay, at the foot of the Croagh 
Patrick. The house stands near the sea, embosomed 
in wood, a garden of three acres, with useful horticul- 
tural productions, at the back of it, and the abbey at a 
little distance. The walls of the abbey are of smooth 
stone in small blocks ; the building contains numerous 
apartments. A place is reserved for the burying of 
priests, and a pile of their leg and arm-bones are now 
in a window to leave room for fresh inmates. 

The Irish appear to have no regard for their dead 
when the flesh is consumed, but leave the bones to 
bleach in the sun, and the skulls to be kicked about as 
foot-balls in any place. A return through Westport 
to Castlebar gave a sight of suffering and degrada- 
tion which could not be heightened. A coach is al- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 231 

ways the rallying point for beggars ; and this morning 
the Roman Catholic Dean was upon the top, and I went 
out to take my seat, but was happy to retreat into a 
shop, for I supposed that all the inmates of the work- 
house were poured out for want of food, and were sent 
to prey upon the inhabitants. In this dreadful flock 
there was not one redeeming quality — not one counte- 
nance that smiled, nor one voice that uttered a sally of 
Irish wit — all was piteous entreaty, without deceit ; 
for no proof was needed of sincerity, but the look they 
gave us. I was urged to my seat through the crowd, 
and no sight like that had ever met my eyes as when 
that coach whirled from that haggard assemblage. 

SOUP-SHOPS. 

It is well known that among the many devices for 
the cure of Ireland's famine, the soup-shops and " stir- 
about" establishments, ranked among the foremost, 
and the most effectual for some time. These were got 
up in many places at a great expense, so much so, that 
had they expected to have fed the nation on beef-bones 
and yellow Indian for centuries to come, they could not 
have been more durably made and fixed. There was 
quite a competition to excel in some places, to make 
not only durable boilers, but something that looked a 
little tasty, and he that " got up " the best was quite 
a hero. But the soup-shop of soup-shops, and the 
boiler of boilers, the one that sung the requiem to all 
that had gone before, was the immortalized one of 
Soyer, the French soup -maker and savory inventer 



232 ANNALS OF THE 

for the " West End " of London. It would seem that 
the Government, on whose shoulders hung this mighty 
" potato-famine," had exhausted all its resources of in- 
vention " to stay the plague " but the one last men- 
tioned, and, driven to their " wits' end," they happily 
hit upon this panacea. 

Every minutia cannot be given, either of the " get- 
ting up," or the " recipe " itself; but the " sum and 
substance " was simply this, that a French cook from 
London was sent to Dublin with a recipe of his own 
concocting, made out of " drippings," whether of 
" shinbones " or " ox-tails " was not specified ; but 
this " dripping " was to be so savory, and withal so 
nourishing, that with a trifling sum, Paddy could be 
fed, and fed too so that he could dig drains, cut turf, 
and spade gardens, on an advanced strength, which 
flung both the potato and " yellow Indian " entirely in 
the " back-ground." The work commenced : a new 
and splendid soup-shop in French and West End 
fashion soon gladdened the eyes of the expecting Irish. 
"By dad," exclaimed one as he passed it, " and there's 
the cratur that'll du the heart good ; not a ha'porth of 
the blackguards will be fightin' for the i yaller Indian ' 
when that's in the stomach." 

So great was this work, that the city was moved 
when the sound went forth that the boiler was ready, 
and the soup actually " under way." A great and 
general invitation was given to the lords and nobles, with 
wives, sons and daughters, to be there, and test this 
n^v^r-equaled pustninpr of life and zest of palate — 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 233 

carriages, horsemen, and footmen, lords in velvet and 
broadcloth, ladies in poplins, satins, flounces and feath- 
ers, bedizened the train. Nor was this all : when 
anything great or good is afloat, the patriotism of Pad- 
dy, in high life and low, is aroused, and he waits not 
for cloak, shoe, or hat — if cloak, shoe and hat be lack- 
ing — but is ready on the spot. And here every beg- 
gar, from Liberty to Cook street, from way-side, hedge 
and ditch, whose strength was adequate, swelled this 
living, moving panorama. Wherever a feather waved 
in the breeze, there a rag fluttered in thrilling harmony. 
The procession entered the hall, where soup-ladles, 
plates and spoons, were in bright array. Lords and 
dukes, duchesses, baronesses, and " ladies of honor," 
walked round this fresh-steaming beverage, each taking 
a sip, and pronouncing it the finest and best. The 
hungry ones heard the verdict, and though some doubt- 
ing ones might scoff, yet the multitude went away de- 
claring they believed that the " blessed soup would put 
the life in 'em." 

The celebrated patentee received his sovereigns, and 
returned to his sauce pots and dripping-pans in the me- 
tropolis of John Bull. The recipe was made over to 
safe hands, the fire extinguished under the boiler, the 
soup- shop closed, and poor Paddy waited long, and in 
vain, for the expected draught ; nor did he awake from 
his hopeful anticipations till the streets of Dublin re- 
sounded, by night and by day, with 

" Sup it up, sup it up, 'twill cure you of the gout," &c. 

The poetry in refinement of style, in orthography or 



234 ANNALS OF THE 

punctuation, did not equal Cowper's " John Gilpin," 
but in aptnesss of invention, and clearness of descrip- 
tion, it was not a whit behind ; and when the echo was 
beginning to swell on the breeze, 

" Up flew the windows all," 

of many a dwelling, whose inmates would shrink from 
the gaze of the vulgar, and blush to be found reading 
by daylight, wit so coarsely expressed. The soup re- 
cipe was not entirely a thing of naught ; it brought to 
the ballad-maker and ballad-singers ready cash for 
many a week ; and the host of disappointed hungry 
ones who followed in the train, found in the poetic ex- 
citement a momentary pause of pain, which said, 

" That the cheek may be tinged with a warm sunny smile, 
Though the cold heart to ruin runs darkly the while." 

I soon left for Cork. A visit to the house of Mr. 
Murry, who, in union with his fellow-laborer, Jordan, 
had established a church of the Independent order, 
under the auspices of the Irish Evangelical Society. 

Their labors are blessed ; the Roman Catholics ap- 
pear to feel that in that little organization good is 
doing, and often when mention was made of it the answer 
would be, " they are a blessed people." Many ex- 
pressed a desire that they might build a chapel, and 
some few had actually contributed a little for that 
purpose. These men had preached Christ and treated 
the people kindly, and they met with no serious opposi- 
tion. They had been impartial in their distributions 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 235 

through the famine, and had never attempted to prose- 
lyte either by a pound of Indian meal, or " ten ounces" 
of black bread. 

A rainy morning took me from Castlebar, and in a 
few hours I reached Tume, and first visited the work- 
house. Eighteen hundred were here doing the same 
thing — nothing ; but one improvement, which is worth 
naming, distinguished this house. All the cast-off bed- 
clothes and ticking were converted into garments for 
the poor, and given them when they left the house. 
Their rags which they wore in, were all flung aside, 
and they went decently out. Next I visited the con- 
vent, and here found half a dozen nuns hiding from the 
world, and yet completely overwhelmed with it. They 
had a company of four hundred children, most of them 
who were starving in the beginning of famine, and have 
instructed and fed them daily. This was the first 
school I had visited during the famine, where the chil- 
dren retained that ruddiness of look and buoyancy of 
manner, so prevalent in the Irish peasantry. " We 
have tested," said a nun, " the strength of the Indian 
meal. These children, through last winter, were fed 
but once a day on stirabout and treacle, and had as 
much as they would take ; they were from among the 
most feeble, but soon became strong and active as you 
now see." They assembled for dinner, and as had 
been their custom, they clasped their hands and silently 
stood, while one repeated these words : " We thank 
thee, O God, for giving us benefactors, and pray that 
they may be blessed with long life and a happy death." 



236 ANNALS OF THE 

" The good Quakers," said a nun, "have kept them 
alive ; and the clothes you see on them are sent through 
that channel, all but the caps, which we provide." 
These children were taken from filth and poverty, 
never knowing the use of the needle, or value of a 
stocking, and now could produce the finest specimens 
of knitting, both ornamental and useful. And looking 
upon these happy faces one might feel that Ireland is 
not wholly lost. My next visit was in the workhouse 
at the old town of Galway. The distress here had 
been dreadful, and most of them seemed waiting in si- 
lent despair for the last finishing stroke of their misery. 
One cleanly-clad fisherman of whom I made inquiries, 
invited me to visit the fishermen's cottages, which be- 
fore the famine were kept tidy, and had the " comfort- 
able bit" at all times ; " now, the fisheries are lost, 
we are too poor to keep up the tackle, and are all 
starving." I followed him to a row of neat cottages, 
where the discouraged housekeepers appeared as if 
they had swept their cottage floors, put on the last 
piece of turf, and had actually sat down to die. 
" Here we are," said one, (as she rose from her stool 
to salute us,) " sitting in these naked walls, without a 
mouthful of bread, and don't know what the good God 
will do for us." This fisherman then showed me into 
the monks' school-rooms, who were teaching and feed- 
ing a number of boys, and showed me some new fishing 
nets which the kind Quakers had sent, and he hoped, 
if they .did not all die, that the u net might sairve 
'em." 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 237 

The workhouse here was on the best plan of any I 
had seen ; the master and matron had been indefatiga- 
ble in placing everything in its true position, and ap- 
peared to feel that their station was a responsible one. 
and that the poor were a sacred trust, belonging still 
to the order of human beings. The food was abun- 
dant and good, and the parents and children allowed to 
see and converse together oftener than in other like es- 
tablishments ; and now, in March, 1850, the same re- 
port is current, that good order and comfort abound 
there, beyond any other. Everlasting peace rest on 
the heads of those who do not make merchandise of 
the poor for gain. 

From Galway, Limerick was the next stopping- 
place, and the poorhouse in that place was so crowded, 
the morning so rainy, and the keepers so busy in gath- 
ering the inmates to the " stirabout/ 5 that but little 
that was satisfactory could be obtained. 

Cork was reached in the evening, with the loss of a 
trunk by the inattention of the coachman, but in a 
few days it was restored by the honesty of a passen- 
ger. As the comfort of the traveling public depends 
so much on coachmen, and as passengers beside have a 
heavy fare to pay, it would be unjust to the public, as 
an individual, not to give a second testimony to the ce- 
lebrated Bianconi's cars and carmen. I should have 
been happy to have found that my complaints in the 
first volume respecting this establishment were not- 
realized as habits, but merely accidental, and that fur- 
ther acquaintance might insure greater esteem ; but a 



238 ANNALS OE THE 

second trial told me that thus far severity had not ex- 
aggerated. I paid rny passage at Limerick for Cork, 
went to Fermoy without any serious difficulty ; here 
vehicles and horses were changed, my trunk placed be- 
yond my care, new passengers seated till the car was 
quite overcharged, when the carman said with inso- 
lence, as he saw me waiting for a seat, " Get on and 
stand up, or else stop till to-morrow, I'll not wait for 
ye." " My passage is paid to Cork, my trunk is be- 
yond my reach, or I would wait," was the answer. 
" Get on quick and stand there, or you're left." I as- 
cended the seat, and holding by the luggage, rode ten 
miles standing in much peril, while the carman occa- 
sionally looked around, and made some waggish joke, 
much to the amusement of decently-clad gentlemen, 
not one of whom offered me a seat. The reader may 
justly inquire — Is this the Irish politeness, of which 
so much has been said in those pages 1 It is not 
instinctive Irish politeness — this is always pure and al- 
ways abundant ; but it is the habit put on and culti- 
vated, by such as having no claim to family or rank, 
have, mushroom-like, started suddenly from a manure - 
heap into a little higher business, and having no educa- 
tion that has in the least disciplined the mind, they at 
once assume the airs of imperious landlords, and keep- 
ers of " whisky-shops," as the best means of estab- 
lishing their advanced standing. 

The county of Cork is the largest county in Ireland, 
and once had four walled towns : — Cork, Youghal, 
Kinsale, and Bandon. It has an extensive sea-coast, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 239 

and ten good harbors. It is everywhere well watered, 
and was once supplied with all kinds of game and cat- 
tle, wool, and woolen and linen yarn. It, like all Ire- 
land, has been sifted and shaken, divided among septs 
and kings, and is now resting under the gracious 
shadow of the Queen Victoria. The population num- 
bered in the year 1841 about 107,682. The beauti- 
ful River Lee, where vessels from the Cove of Cork 
enter, flows through the city, giving from the hill top 
and side to the neat trellised cottages that hang there 
a cheerful aspect of life and commerce wdiich few towns 
can claim. A sail from Cove Harbor up the Lee, to 
the city, cannot be surpassed in beauty, on a pleasant 
evening. The Venetian boatman might here find ma- 
terial enough to add a new stanza to his Gondolier 
song ; and if angels retain any wish for the sin- 
scathed scenery of earth, they might strike here their 
golden harps, and sing anew the sweet song 

' : Peace on earth, and good will to men." 

The whole distance is so variedly enchanting that 
the overcharged eye, as it drops its lingering curtain 
upon one fairy spot, pauses, in doubt whether its next 
opening can greet beauties like the last. Cove, now a 
town containing a population of about 7000, is built 
upon the sloping side of a hill, in Terraces ; and at 
the foot of the hill is a line of houses called the Beach 
and Crescent. 

This beautiful town, now named Queenstown, in 
honor of the landing of Victoria, in the summer of 



240 ANNALS OF THE 

1849, when Her Majesty placed her foot for the first 
time on that green isle, and honored that spot with its 
first impression, was, half a century ago, but a misera- 
ble fishing hamlet, the remains of which are most 
hideously and squalidly looking out, on the north side, 
called " Old Cove." However squalid the old houses 
may look, there are more redeeming qualities here than 
any town in Ireland. It is snugly sheltered from winds 
by the hill ; and this hill is so continually washed with 
fresh showers from the buckets of heaven, that it needs 
no police regulations to keep the declivity in a condi- 
tion for the most delicate foot and olfactory nerves to 
walk without difficulty or offense. Then the broad old 
river spreading out beneath its foot, presenting a har- 
bor of six miles in length and three in breadth, dotted 
with four islands, Spike, Hawlbouline, Rocky, and 
Coney, with two rivers, Ballinacurra and Awnbree, be- 
side many pretty streamlets emptying into it. The 
harbor is backed by hills of the greenest and richest, 
and ornamented with five Martello towers, so called 
from a tower in the Bay of Martello, in the island of 
Corsica. As nearly all the present names of places in 
Ireland had an Irish root, and this root has a significa- 
tion, a knowledge of these, places the history in many 
cases in a clear and useful light. The village and glen 
of Monkston stretched along, with the church and old 
castle, with spire and towers overlooking the whole, 
first meet the view ; then a mile further, Passage, a 
village extending nearly a mile, with a quay and bath- 
ing houses, and taken as a whole is interesting, as a 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 241 

busy thoroughfare. Blackrock Castle soon catches the 
eye, and its situation and happy construction can hardly 
be improved by imagination. It looks out upon Lake 
Mahon and the picturesque islands which dot it ; and 
farther on upon the right is Mount Patrick, where 
stands the tower dedicated to Theobald Mathew ; and 
before reaching Cork, embosomed in trees, is the seat 
of Mr. Penrose, called Woodhill, and possesses the un- 
dying honor of the spot where the daughter of Curran 
was married to Captain Henry Sturgeon. It is long 
since Moore sung in sweet strains the never-to-be-for- 
gotten melody of 

" She is far from the land where her young hero sleeps, 
And lovers are round her sighing ; 
But coldly she turns from their gaze and weeps, 
For her heart in his grave is lying. 

" ! make her a grave where the sunbeams rest, 
When they promise a glorious morrow, 
They'll shine o'er her sleep like a smile from the West, 
From her own lov'd island of sorrow." 

Cork stands on a marshy spot ; its name in Irish is 
Corcaig, signifying a moor or marsh, and the city owes 
its origin to St. Fin Bar, who first founded a cathe- 
dral, in the seventh century, near the south branch of 
the Lee, and from this beginning Corcaig-more, or the 
great Cork, arose ; and though this city has passed 
through changes and great sufferings, yet it has for a 
long time maintained a respectable, if not high stand- 
ing, for intelligence. Schools are numerous, and some 
of them of a high order, and the laboring classes are 
mostly well educated in a plain way. The Roman 
11 



242 ANNALS OF THE 

Catholics give nine thousand children gratuitous in- 
struction in the various schools, and the Protestants 
have done much, their schools being liberally endowed, 
and probably it would not be exaggeration to say, that 
in no city in the kingdom of like population would 
more people among the poorer classes be found who 
could read, than in Cork. The convents, too, have 
done nobly in this respect, educating a multitude of 
children of the poor without any compensation. J. 
Windell has justly said, that " the great majority of 
the working class are all literate, and generally ac- 
quainted with the elements of knowledge ; the middle 
classes, in intelligence, and in the acquisition of solid 
as well as graceful information, are entitled to a very 
distinguished place." The Royal Cork Institution has 
a library of from five to six thousand volumes, the 
Cork Library has nine thousand volumes, and the Cork 
Mechanics' Institute has a small one, beside private 
libraries of considerable note. It may be doubtful 
whether it can be said that, as in the one in Belfast, 
there are in it no works of fiction. The summer of 
1848 found the city rallying a little from the fearful 
effects of the famine ; for in a county so large, embrac- 
ing so much sea-coast, marshy ground, &c, there must 
be found many poor in the best times in Ireland. The 
Friends' Society, connected with the Dublin Central 
Committee, acted with untiring efficiency ; and Theo- 
bald Mathew labored for months in giving out Ameri- 
can donations which were intrusted to him. The nuns, 
too, had children to a great amount, whom they daily 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 243 

fed. The British Association, likewise, were there, 
but death fearfully went on. Let the walls of that 
workhouse tell the story of the hundreds carried out 
upon " sliding coffins," and buried in pits. Let the 
cemetery of Theobald Mathew show its ten thousand, 
which he buried there in huge graves, opening a yawn- 
ing gulf, and throwing in lime, then adding coffinless 
bodies daily, till the pit was filled ; then opening an- 
other, till ten thousand were numbered ! The rain had 
washed the loose dirt away in some spots, and parts of 
the bodies were exposed in a few places. A painful 
sight ! 

The Cork Committee acted most efficiently, and the 
name of Abraham Beale has left there a sweet and last- 
ing remembrance. Beside the city of Cork, the rural 
districts were in the greatest distress, and this benevo- 
lent, indefatigable laborer turned his energies unceas- 
ingly to those districts, faithfully discharging his duty, 
till his health failed ; and his biographer states, that 
" His last act of public duty was the attendance of the 
Relief Committee, in which he had so assiduously la- 
bored." Typhus fever took him in a few days to the 
" mansion" which, doubtless, was prepared for him ; for 
though he said, " I have been but an unprofitable serv- 
ant," yet the living testify that his profiting appeared 
unto all. He died in August, 1847, while the scourge 
was still raging ; and in 1848 his name was fresh on the 
lips of many in that city, who, with his two bereaved 
sisters, say, they have lost in him a friend and a father. 
" The memory of the just is truly blessed." 



244 ANNALS OF THE 

Though in the summer of 1848 many were suffering, 
yet the workhouse was not filled with the dying as be- 
fore, and the "sliding coffin" never met my eye. 
The indefatigable nuns still were overwhelmed with 
children, many of whom were placed there by Father 
Mathew, and in one contiguous to his chapel were 
about thirteen hundred, who were fed when food could 
be obtained. One of the most affecting items of the 
famine, if item it may be called, is the multitude of 
orphans left in that afflicted country, and the saying 
was becoming quite a common one, when a hungry child 
was asked where he lived, or where his father and 
mother were, to answer, " They died sir (or ma'am), in 
the stirabout times." This alluded to the year 1847 
particularly, when the " stirabout " was most in vogue. 
The "black bread times" now have an imperishable 
name in the west of Ireland, and " Soyer's soup " will 
not die in the memory of the wags of Dublin, till wars, 
pestilence, and famine shall cease to the ends of the 
earth. 

The environs of Cork had not lost any of their 
charms by the scourge, and Blarney seemed to have 
put on new beauties ; her old castle and Blarney stone, 
now supported with two iron grasps, are still looking 
forth from the shrubbery and trees, which wildly sur- 
round it, for the good taste of the owner keeps the 
pruning knife confined to his enchanting gardens and 
walks, and allows nature here to frolic according to her 
own vagaries. The sycamore, oak, arbutus, elm, ash, 
holly, copper-beech, and ivy, were mingling and com- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 245 

mingling, without any aristocratic airs of family descent 
or caste. 

A stranger here would wonder what famine could 
have to do in these pleasant grounds ; and while ram- 
bling among its moss-covered stones, wild flowers, and 
creeping ivy, its shady seats, alcoves, and grottos, we 
felt that an Italian gardener could scarcely make a 
spot more enchanting, even though an Italian sky 
should mingle its blandness. 

The company, too, in such places, has much to do 
in heightening or diminishing the pleasure, and even 
beauty of such scenes. Mine was a happy lot this day. 
The young Beales, who were the party, with a London 
acquaintance, had a natural and .cultivated relish for 
treats like these, and while we were taking our pic-nic 
in that grove of delights, gladly would I have forgotten 
the sorrows of the past and avoided a dread of the fu- 
ture, but could not ; for notwithstanding Blarney pleas- 
ure grounds, we were in woe-stricken Ireland still, and 
we knew that desponding hearts and hungry stomachs 
were not far distant. A cheerful walk home led us 
through Blarney Lane, in the suburbs of Cork, where 
the neatness of the cottages, with a flower-pot in many 
a window, had an interest beyond what had been pre- 
sented in any suburb of Ireland's large towns, since 
the famine. We took welcome liberties to look occa- 
sionally into one, and found all invariably tidy, and 
what was still more creditable, the women were busy 
at work. This said that Cork had still a living germ 
within her, that might and would be resuscitated ; for 



246 ANNALS OF THE 

if woman's hands are well employed, however unnoticed 
her little inventions and doings may be, they at last 
work out, and bring forth untold comforts, which are 
more valuable because diffused insensibly where most 
needed. 

" The little foxes spoil the vines," and little things 
are the foundation of all great ones, and had Ireland, 
as well as the whole world beside, looked better to this, 
better effects would have been produced. Cork may 
boast as many efficient men, and active useful women, 
probably, as any town in Ireland. It has a Father 
Mathew and a William Martin, to urge by precept and 
example the importance and benefits of sobriety and 
industry ; it has a Society of Friends, whose religion 
and discipline encourage no drones, and its intelligence 
has broken down that caste which so much exists in 
many parts of the country, and rendered the people of 
all classes more accessible than in any other city in 
Ireland. Fifteen weeks' stopping there heightened my 
admiration of the true hospitality and capabilities of 
the inhabitants ; and those flowery hill-sides and rose- 
covered gateways and windows that hung over the Lee, 
will be held ever in the sweetest remembrance. " The 
little room," where one week of the pleasantest was 
spent, deserves an acknowledgment which I am not 
able to give. May that cottage and its inmates long 
be united as happily and sweetly as their industry and 
beauty so richly merit. 

A short excursion to Castlemartyr, fifteen miles from 
Cork, took me through a richly cultivated country, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 247 

where fields of wheat, barley, and oats are ripening for 
the harvest ; but five fields of blasted potatoes that we 
passed, said that they had not yet recovered courage 
and strength to look out again upon the world, as in 
days gone by. 

The feelings of the people are so sensitive, that they 
are not willing to speak of the subject when the fields 
begin to droop, and when mention is made of the ap- 
pearance of a new failure, everything favorable is 
brought to bear on the subject ; and often one member 
of a family has been known to keep all knowledge from 
the others, that might have reached him. Castlemartyr 
was once a parliamentary borough ; the castle has long 
been famous for battles and plunders, and King Wil- 
liam's forces, after the Battle of the Boyne, charged a 
body of three hundred Irish, who fled to the castle, 
were driven out, the fortress surrendered, with the loss 
of sixty men, and sixteen prisoners taken. The Irish, 
in 1671, got possession of the town, but were driven 
out, and the castle since has laid in ivy-covered ruins, 
being used as a wine-cellar by Lord Shannon. It is 
surrounded with the loftiest trees, and a lawn of eme- 
rald green runs down to a lake upon one side of it. A 
thousand acres of the most richly cultivated land be- 
long to this domain ; a canal, three lakes, an extensive 
deer park, walks and rides, a flower garden of rare 
beauty, and kitchen garden of great size. Near the 
castle stands his lordship's house, containing a center 
and two wings. 

The apparatus for hunting is a great curiosity. 



248 ANNALS OF THE 

Forty-two pleasure-horses for this sport were stabled 
here in apartments much better than the dwellings of 
the laboring class, and the richly tipped harness, with 
their bright stirrups and saddles, were still hanging, as 
mementoes of former greatness, and ready for use, 
should the absentee find it for his benefit to return to 
his pleasure grounds. The famine and other embar- 
rassments have compelled him to suspend his hunting 
pleasures at present ; his hounds were dismissed, his 
horses sold, and his carriages remain in silent waiting. 
The town had suffered like all others, in the famine, 
and the rich widow where I stopped told sad tales of 
what had passed ; but so engrossed was she with the 
loss of her husband, that she could find little space for 
the woes of others in her heart. She took me upon a 
desolate sea-coast some ten miles distant, and there was 
misery ever fresh and ever young. The strange leap 
from a domain in Ireland to a hut or village of the 
poor, is nowhere so vivid in any county as here. I was 
glad to leave this spot and return to Cork ; but a few 
short excursions more must finish all. A flower-show 
was a treat which always brings out all that is beauti- 
ful to the eye, so far as fashion is concerned. Here 
lords and ladies are found, and though they would not 
like a vulgar stare, yet they would not disapprove of 
a little admiration given to style and beauty. The 
show was a splendid one, and gave great credit to 
the skill of gardeners, who are certainly not infe- 
rior in taste in Ireland to any in the kingdom. The 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 249 

ladies too, were the ladies of Ireland — " fair to look 
upon." 

SPIKE ISLAND. 

Strangers were not permitted, in the year 1848, to 
visit the convicts on Spike Island, but fortunately being 
a few days in the family of Doctor Maurice Power, 
M.P., he was, in consequence of his standing, allowed 
a peep among them, and had the privilege of taking all 
who belonged to his family ; — his wife, daughter, and 
myself were his company. This island is rough in its 
appearance, containing some one hundred and eighty 
acres, and has been a fortified island from about 
1791-2. Here we found convicts from every part of 
Ireland, who were deemed worthy of an exile from 
home for the space of seven years. The number of 
these victims was about eight hundred and forty ; some 
employed in digging out rocks and leveling rough places, 
some in making mats of cocoa-nut bark, some knitting, 
and some marching round a circle made up on the pave- 
ment, for exercise and punishment. A school is kept 
where for two hours in rotation all who are of suitable 
age, and cannot read and write, are taught these 
branches. The teacher remarked, when pointing to 
three hundred pupils, " these persons are docile, and I 
believe honest ; their only crime being taking food when 
starving." Some of these young men and boys had 
thrown a stone into a bread shop, some had stolen a 
turnip, and some a sheep ; but every one was induced 
by extreme hunger to do the deed. But we are gravely 
1 11* 



250 ANNALS OF THE 

told in Ireland that property must be protected, though 
life should be squandered. The teacher added, " I 
cannot look on these men and boys as criminals." A 
few others had been guilty of manslaughter ; and one 
gentlemanly appearing man had been guilty of embez- 
zling public money — he was overseeing the making of 
mats. A dexterous pickpocket, not yet fifteen, was 
present, from Dublin, who had., when there, fifty men 
under pay ; and in the presence of us all he showed his 
propensity, by keeping one hand upon his work and the 
other apparently carelessly upon the skirt of Doctor 
Power's coat near the pocket. This sad boy will not 
be cured by forced abstinence ; the keepers informed 
us that he steals for the pleasure of it — taking what he 
does not want, such as handkerchiefs and stockings, 
which he can neither wear nor dispose of. The lodg- 
ing-rooms were large, and well ventilated ; and num- 
bers sleep in the same apartment, without any guard. 
The solitary cells were very cold, — the walls reeking 
with wet ; but as these are only for the incorrigibles — 
if none behave unseemly, none need to inhabit them. 
The room where the unfortunate Mitchell was confined, 
when on his way to Bermuda, was shown us ; it was 
larger than any other single room, and had the luxury 
of a board floor, and would, if nicely fitted up, make a 
tolerable farm kitchen. But report fell far short of 
the reality, when she said that this traitor was treated 
more like a gentleman than a felon, occupying a draAv- 
ing-room, well furnished. The bread was good, made 
of unbolted wheat meal, and the quantity quite sufli- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 251 

cient. Cocoa is given every Sabbath morning, and 
meat for dinner. Much better in any way were these 
convicts than any inmates of a workhouse in Ireland. 
We sailed from Spike up the beautiful Corigaline, and 
its winding course presented us rich beauties of foli- 
age, gentlemen's seats, and rose-covered cottages. A 
clear sun, like that of my native home, shone upon this 
landscape ; and in sight of the river, mid the song of 
birds, with children sporting about us, in this wooded 
spot we took a pleasant " pic nic," which was greatly 
valued by me, because the carmen were sitting too, at 
a little distance, partaking of the same repast, when 
one sent a civil inquiry to Mrs. P. to know if the pud- 
ding had whisky in it, as he was a teetotaler, and could 
not take it if anything of the kind were in it. He was 
assured it was pure. 

The whole to me was quite American, Dr. P. hav- 
ing graduated in a college there, his wife being a na- 
tive, and his daughter born there, and had he not been 
an M.P. we might have talked republican things. 
Why is this partiality for country and home so deeply 
fixed in the human heart 1 Is it not selfish, and does 
it not tend to contract, and even sour the mind against 
what often is more valuable than home produce 1 

THE MATHEW TOWER. 

Among the many interesting subjects of people and 
things in the city of Cork, may be included as preemi- 
nent this beautiful tower, standing upon Mount Pat- 
rick, overlooking the pleasant waters of the Lee. It 



252 ANNALS OF THE 

is three miles from Cork, on an elevation of eight hun- 
dred feet, and was erected by William O'Connor, en- 
tirely at his own expense. Theobald Mathew visited 
London in the year 1843, and his generous reception 
suggested the idea to O'Connor, who was present, to 
erect a monument in commemoration of the event, and 
as an honorable memento to future generations of the 
indefatigable labors of the great Apostle of Temper- 
ance. The history of this spot gives to the visitor a 
double interest, especially so, when he is told that the 
founder was a tailor, who, through his shears, was 
enabled to give three thousand guineas for the tower 
alone. 

A few years since, this now blooming garden of trees, 
shrubs, and flowers, was a wilderness of woods, and 
the soil the most unpromising. O'Connor purchased 
twenty acres, cut down the trees, leaving a few for or- 
nament, dug up the roots, and made an entirely new 
soil, by materials taken from the mud and gravel of the 
Lee, at Cork, and planted this new-made land with 
potatoes, giving employment to a great number of men ; 
and when the harvest was gathered he made the whole 
of it as an offering of the first fruits to the poor. The 
Sisters of Mercy shared largely in this donation, as al- 
moners of the gift. He then built a neat cottage, 
which he inhabited with a sister, who has since de- 
ceased. A fine gravelly walk conducts the visitor from 
the gate leading to the cottage through a rich thicket of 
laurel, arbutus, and firs, opening upon a tasteful flower 
ground, descending from the cottage, which is ascended 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 253 

by fourteen stone steps with iron railings. On the 
right and left from the hill, two rooms are fitted up in 
good modern taste for the reception of visitors. In 
the center of each stands a table, one containing the 
periodicals of the day, the other only a large ancient 
Bible. The walls are adorned with a variety of pic- 
tures, some of which are the best specimens of drawing. 
Two, which are dedicated to the Queen and Prince 
Albert, and executed entirely with a pen, by McDon- 
nell of Cork, are almost without a parallel. They 
contain an address by the Mayor, Aldermen, and 
Council of the city of Cork, on the birth of the Prince 
of Wales, in 1841. They are both executed in a 
manner that entitles them to a standing among the 
highest ornamental works. A portrait of O'Connor 
hangs in the same room, with one of Ediin Forest, and 
a few others, of the best model. The left-hand room 
represents the Queen, with an infant on her lap, and 
another child standing by her side ; another of the 
Virgin and Child of peculiar beauty. A frame-work 
containing the baptismal cake of one of the Queen's 
children, and a vial of caudle. The frame is lined on 
the back with a piece of satin, embroidered with the 
crown of the King of Prussia, and is a piece from the 
vest he wore ; the sides are of embroidered satin, like 
that worn by the Queen, with her crown wrought upon 
it, and which is worn on the baptismal occasions of her 
children. A fourth is Louis Philippe receiving the 
visit of Victoria, in France, beside two other pictures 
not named. In the hall hangs the picture of the " tes- 



254 ANNALS OF THE 

timonial" or tower, and opposite is the monument o"f 
Scott. 

In a little opening at the back of the hall, is a glass 
case, containing a choice collection of shells, and on each 
side from this are two nicely-furnished bed-rooms; 
these rooms with a kitchen include all the dwelling 
part. Two wings, with artificial windows, are attach- 
ed to the cottage ; the glass, frame and blind, are such 
a finished imitation of the reality, that one must touch 
them to be convinced of their mockery. Two winding 
paths from the cottage lead up the ascent to the monu- 
ment. A circular stone-wall containing a small foun- 
tain is the first object, in the center of this is a curi- 
ously-wrought pedestal, surmounted by a large basin, 
in which is seated a boy, whose business is to spirt 
water from his mouth through a small tube, when any 
one is so kind as to open a pipe underground, by a 
key, which pipe communicates with one from the top of 
the tower, which conveys the water from a cistern fix- 
ed near the top ; near this fountain stands a boy, 
grasping in his hands a snake, which is wound about 
one leg ; but the boy holds him fast in defiance : this 
is the serpent alcohol. On the right of the boy stands 
an angel to strengthen him. Theobald Mathew is 
standing back, and over this group, in a figure larger 
than life, with his right hand pointing to the fountain, 
while his left arm rests upon a pedestal. Above all 
this stands the testimonial, the door facing the west. 
Two dogs are resting upon a pedestal at the entrance ; 
both are portraits of one dog, who saved the lives of 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 255 

eidit men who fell into the Thames. He was elected 
a member of the Humane Society of London, and now 
wears a gold collar. Next the door stand two war- 
riors, one a Roman, the other a British officer, repre- 
senting the two religions. 

Peeping over the wall is the head of a gray horse, 
and around the tower are various statues ; the first is 
Fidelity, represented by a female with a dog looking 
up to her face ; Faith, with a cross ; Hope, with an an- 
chor ; Charity, with a child in her arms ; and Plenty, 
with a bunch of wheat in her hand. 

The tower is circular, though all in one massive pil- 
lar, yet it has the appearance of two, one smaller and 
taller, with the union jack waving from the top. There 
are two apartments in this tower, the window cases and 
frames are of fluted oak, surmounted by carved heads, 
stucco-work is over these, and continued along the 
ceiling. Inclosed in a glass shade, on a rosewood pe- 
destal, is a model bust of the apostle Mathew, and over 
this, one of the Right Rev. Dr. Murphy, Bishop of 
the Catholic church. A massive chimney-piece has 
upon it a basso-relievo figure of Father Mathew, hold- 
ing in one hand Britannia, in the other Erin, the em- 
blems of both countries surrounding them. A large 
chandelier is suspended from the ceiling, and the upper 
portions of the windows are of stained glass. This 
circular room is sixteen feet in diameter. 

This description is minutely given because there are 
pleasant and painful reminiscences of my visit to that 
spot. Theobald Mathew was there, he is now in the 



256 ANNALS OF THE 

land of my fathers ; friends were there that will meet 
me no more ; and the generous heart was there who 
fitted this enchanting elysiuni for the man he so much 
honored, and for the happy resort of friends who might 
honor him too. The cottage, the garden, and testimo- 
nial are there. The hyacinth, the rose, the holly, and 
fir, are still blooming in fragrance and verdure ; but, 
alas ! the heart that designed and the hand that com- 
pleted them are cold in the dust. That relentless 
scourge the cholera, which has spared neither age nor 
station, has laid him low ; and who will trim afresh 
that hill- side, and brighten the neat cottage and pretty 
summer-house, for the happy eye and sweet resting 
spot of the visitor and stranger ? Who will keep open 
the welcome gate that introduces to shrubbery walks of 
arbutus and flower-beds ; and to the chaste testimonial, 
which has been and must be the admiration of every 
eye that has rested upon it 1 Will it fall into hands 
that will add fresh garlands to honor the memory of 
him who erected it 1 Who will still say to every lover 
of temperance and beauty, " Come in freely and ban- 
quet on these delights of nature and of art ?" Or 
will contracted minds and penurious hearts close its 
gates to all but aristocratic passports and shilling fees ? 
Let sacred respect for the honor of the generous de- 
parted forbid it ; and let love for the benevolent apostle 
to whom it was dedicated, forbid it. 

While penning these pages, intelligence of the death 
of O'Connor was forwarded me by the pen of one who 
first introduced me to that spot, and this circumstance 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 257 

prompts to the insertion of the following documents, as 
a tribute of respect due to the deceased, and which to 
me are doubly valued, because this tribute did not wait 
till he to whom it was owing should be no more. What 
a comment on good sense and justice, what a mockery 
of the dead, to write eulogiums and build costly monu- 
ments to him who, while living, was carelessly neglect- 
ed, or willfully despised ! O'Connor's history, as was 
related by a friend, was simply this : He was the son of 
a poor widow, belonging to a rural district, and was 
early sent to Cork, where he acquired the trade of a 
tailor, and by persevering industry, good conduct, and 
economy, he became first in the profession of a mer- 
chant tailor, and through his shears he amassed a 
handsome fortune, before reaching the meridian of life. 
With this fortune, let the Mathew Testimonial tell 
part of the honorable use he made of his money. He 
had no family, but his attachment to friends was deep- 
ly manifest in the love he bore toward the sister, who 
lived with him in the cottage on Mount Patrick. He 
left it when she was buried, and said he could never 
tarry in it another night, and observed that it was 
purely out of respect to strangers that he ever visit- 
ed it. 

The origin of the letters which follow was simply 
this : When going over these grounds, through the cot- 
tage, and through the tower, but one item seemed to be 
wanting to make the whole complete, that was, a few 
choice literary books to grace the center-table of that 
otherwise well-fitted drawing-room. It was proposed 



258 ANNALS OF THE 

to a few friends, and was done without any intention of 
display, or wish to have it thus memorialized. A let- 
ter was sent me the following day, and an answer re- 
turned the next. They both unexpectedly appeared in 
print, in the Cork Examiner , a few days after, where 
they doubtless would have slept forever, had not the 
death of O'Connor revived so painfully the visit to that 
beautiful spot. 

If ever vanity, ambition, or pride, have stimulated 
me to seek notice or applause from men, these propen- 
sities have been so subdued, that when contempt has 
been added to privation, I have felt an inward grati- 
tude, that since in Ireland so few comparatively hin- 
dered my labors by false attentions and fulsome flat- 
teries, which travelers too much seek in foreign lands ; 
and never should any of the neglects or rudeness which 
have been received been recorded ; were it not that 
the character of the people was the object to find out 
and show, rather than to draw pity or favor to my- 
self :— 

THE MATHEW TOWER MRS. NICHOLSON. 

Last week, Mrs. Nicholson, now well known by her 
tour on foot through Ireland, and the very interesting 
book which she has written descriptive of her wander- 
ings, paid a visit to Mount Patrick. She was accom- 
panied by some friends. She was met by the Very 
Rev. Mr. Mathew, Mr. O'Connor, the hospitable pro- 
prietor, and some other gentlemen. After visiting the 
Tower, which is now superbly finished, and promises to 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 259 

stand in firmness and durability, for the next five hun- 
dred years, and perambulating the grounds which are 
laid out in a highly ornamental style, the parties par- 
took of lunch, which consisted principally of fruits and 
coffee. Mrs. Nicholson, and the friend who accom- 
panied her, are, besides being strict total abstainers, 
also vegetarians, disciples of a strict dietetic school, in 
which no animal food is permitted. The object of her 
visit was then announced ; it was to present to Mr. 
O'Connor, a small but beautiful select library, in tes- 
timony of her ardent respect for the cause and the 
Apostle of Temperance, and in kindly appreciation of 
the services and worth of Mr. O'Connor, who not only 
built a testimonial unexampled in the history of such 
memorials erected by private individuals, but with a 
hospitality that cannot be over-estimated, throws open 
his grounds daily to the public. Mrs. Nicholson pre- 
sented the following short address : — 

tc These volumes are presented by a few friends of 
temperance, in grateful acknowledgment of his gene- 
rosity in throwing open his tasteful and beautiful place 
to the public, and for the purpose of affording a profit- 
able recreation to its numerous visitors ; with a desire 
that the lovely spot may be ever sacred to that glorious 
cause, to whose most successful and untiring advocate 
it has been dedicated, and to the advancement of uni- 
versal philanthropy. 

" Cork, August 28th, 1848." 



260 ANNALS OF THE 

The reply was as follows : — 

Madam, — I receive the books with pride and pleas- 
ure. The subject of each volume, and the names of 
the authors remarkable in our literature for their genius 
or scientific knowledge, are the best tests of your own 
pure taste and judgment. 

Ten years have elapsed since I found this spot a 
wilderness — four since a monument, I hope an endur- 
ing one, has been erected, to perpetuate, in a small de- 
gree, the true greatness and glory of the Christian 
benefactor of Ireland. As that monument belongs to 
him and the public and as those grounds, which you 
and others have been pleased to eulogize, are but the 
abiding place of the Tower of Temperance, so my 
gates have never been closed, and never shall be, 
against visitors, whether they be residents of our own 
favored but unfortunate land, or citizens of Europe, or 
of your own great country. 

It is a singular spectacle to witness — a lady gently 
nurtured and brought up, giving up, for a time, home 
and country and kindred — visiting a land stricken with 
famine — traversing on foot that land from boundary to 
boundary — making her way over solitary mountains 
and treading through remote glens, where scarcely the 
steps of civilization have reached, sharing the scanty 
potato of the poor but hospitable people, and lying 
down after a day of toil, in the miserable but secure 
cabin of a Kerry or Connaught peasant. All this is 
unusual. But above it shines, with a steady light, 
your sympathy, your benevolence, your gentleness of 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 261 

heart, and your warm appreciation of the virtues, rude 
but sincere, of a people whose condition it is neces- 
sary to improve, in order to make them contented and 
happy. 

The first step to raise them socially, to create in 
them self-respect, and elevate their shrewdness into 
the wisdom of morality, has been taken by the man 
whom you revered so much, and to whom and not to 
me, you have this day paid a grateful and graceful 
tribute. May he live forever in the memories of his 
country ! 

You are about to depart for your own great country, 
because you could not witness again the desolation of 
another famine. But you will carry back from Ire- 
land the heartfelt sense of her people for past kindness, 
to your Christian countrymen. To them, to the gener- 
ous people of England, and to the Society of Friends 
in England, Ireland and America, we are indebted, 
but utterly unable to discharge the debt. 

Again, Madam, expressing my deep sense of your 
kindness and personal worth, and wishing you many 
happy years in your beloved America, 
I beg to subscribe myself, 

Your grateful servant, 

William O'Connor. 

Mount Patrick, Jlugust 31st, 1848. 



TO WILLIAM 

Sir, — The unmerited compliment you publicly be- 
stowed on a stranger, in the last week's Examiner, de- 



262 ANNALS OF THE 

serves a public acknowledgment, and the more cheer- 
fully given, because it affords an opportunity of saying, 
that not to me alone is the honor due of the small be- 
stowment of books upon your table. It says, " there 
are hearts in Cork that do appreciate the Mathew Tes- 
timonial, as well as the noble generosity of the man 
who designed it, and though small the offering, it may 
be the prelude to more liberal demonstrations of a peo- 
ple's gratitude." 

These few volumes, it is hoped, are but the alphabet 
to a well chosen library that shall one day grace a 
room in the Tower, affording the citizen and the stran- 
ger a profitable, as well as a pleasant recreation. 

And now, sir, allow me to say, that in a four years' 
tour through this beautiful isle, from the Donegal sea 
to Cape Clear — from the mountains of Wicklow to the 
Killery Peaks, I have never seen from the top of man- 
sion or castle a flag so gracefully waving — a flag on 
which is inscribed so much love of country — so much 
just appreciation of worth — and so much that deserves 
the appellation of " Well done," as that which is fly- 
ing in the breeze from the tower of Mount Patrick, and 
should my eyes ever again look out upon the proud 
mountains and waters of my own native land, when 
memory shall revert to the summer of 1848, the bright- 
est and happiest associations will be — the hours passed 
in the cottage and tower, the garden and walks dedi- 
cated to the man who lives for humanity. And though 
I return to my people with a sorrowing heart, that the 
tear is still on the long wasted cheek of Erin, yet this 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 263 

shall be my joy, that there live among her country- 
loving sons, hearts that can feel and hands that can 
act, when worth and virtue make the demand, and to 
the proud monument of Mount Patrick will I point as 
a witness, to all who may sail up the green banks of 
the sweet-flowing Lee. 

When the hand of Theobald Mathew shall cease to 
rest on the head of the pledge-taking postulant, and 
when he shall have been gathered to the dust of his 
fathers — when the generous heart that devised the last- 
ing memorial shall have stopped its pulsation forever — 
on every health-blowing breeze that fans the flag of 
Mount Patrick, shall be whispered — "Peace to the 
Apostle of Temperance, who said to the wine-maddened 
brain of the maniac, Peace be still, who wiped the 
tear from the face of heart-stricken woman, and who 
6 lifted up him that was ready to fall.' " 

And when from heaven's high battlement his genfle 
spirit shall look down on this Tower, future generations 
shall rise in succession and call him " blessed." 

And let their long-sounding echo reverberate over 
mountain and glen, " honor and gratitude to William 
O'Connor." 

Asenath Nicholson. 

Ireland " I love thee still." 

September 4th, 1848. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

" Oh! could we from death but recover." 
THE GRAVE OF CHARLES WOLFE. 

It was in the cottage of Dr. Power that unexpect- 
edly the sweet strains of the " Soldier's Grave " were 
struck by Mrs. P., and awakened again those sensa- 
tions which were stirred, when in the city of New York, 
a few days before sailing for Ireland, I heard them for 
the first time ; and here was told that the author was 
sleeping in a humble burying-ground but two miles 
from the spot. 

In two days Mrs. P. accompanied me to the stran- 
gers' churchyard adjoining an old crumbling ivy-cov- 
ered ruin of a church, where sleep together in a rank 
grass -grown spot, the sailor and the soldier who dies 
from home, in this harbor, and where seldom a foot 
tramples on the wild weed that grows tall in the uneven 
inclosure where they sleep. Here and there a coarse 
monument tells that ,Captain M., or Lieutenant G. 

died in this harbor, Anno Domini, , but Charles 

Wolfe was not among them, his was a bed detached, 
and confined within the wall of one corner of the church, 
with a humble flat stone over his breast. The roof of 



THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 265 

the church is gone, and the entrance to his grave, when 
the sexton is not there to unlock it, is over the wall by 
climbing a ladder. A look through the key-hole showed 
that luxuriant weeds and stones from the crumbling 
wall had well-nigh concealed the epitaph, which told 
his age and death. His short story was easily re- 
hearsed ; for like all true merit, he was unostentatious, 
and asked not that the world should honor him. His 
birth-place was Dublin, in 1791, a descendant of the 
military hero Wolfe, who was slain at Quebec. He was 
sent to Bath, in England, in 1801, to school, where his 
mother removed at the death of his father, then to Dr. 
Evans's, then to Winchester, where his amiable dispo- 
sition made him greatly beloved, and his classical at- 
tainments gained him great distinction without flatter- 
ing his vanity. He never in one instance received a 
reprimand from a teacher, and his sister adds, that to 
her recollection he never acted contrary to his mother's 
wishes during his life. He cheerfully gave up the idea 
of a military profession, which he had imbibed, because 
he found it was unpleasant to his mother. In 1808 
the family returned to Ireland, and in 1809 he entered 
Dublin College. He soon distinguished himself as a 
poet ; his Jugurtha Incoraratus was written in the 
first year of college, the year when his mother died, an 
event which left a lasting impression in his heart. .He 
soon after won a prize and became a college tutor, 
obtained a scholarship, and his talents for prose 
and verse, as well as oratory, soon manifested them- 
selves. 

12 



266 ANNALS OF THE 

The poem which gave him such deserved celebrity 
was published without his knowledge, and it originated 
in his mind by reading a paragraph, as follows. Sir 
John Moore had often said, that if he was killed in 
battle, he wished to be buried where he fell. 

" The body was removed at midnight to the citadel 
of Corunna. A grave was dug for him on the rampart 
there, by a party of the 9th Regiment, the aide-de- 
camps attending by turns. No coffin could be pro- 
cured, and the officers of his staff wrapped the body, 
dressed as it was, in a military cloak and blankets. 
The interment was hastened, for about eight in the 
morning some firing was heard, and the officers feared 
if a serious attack were made they should be ordered 
away, and not suffered to pay him that last dut} r . The 
officers of his army bore him to the grave — the funeral 
service was read by the chaplain, and the corpse was 
covered with earth." 

Thus they buried him at dead of night, and- — 

" He lay like a warrior taking his rest, 
With his martial cloak about him." 

His biographer says, had he written no other poetry, 
this poem would have entitled him to the name of poet 
of poets. He had one peculiarity : in reading, he ana- 
lyzed the subject to its origin, and there tarried so long, 
that he seldom perused it to the end — he digested 
thoroughly what he did read, but seldom read a book 
through. He was an enthusiastic admirer of the 
scenery of his own country. Lough Bray, Wicklow, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 267 

and the Dargle, have been graphically portrayed by 
his pen. 

He became pious, but humbly laid his attainments 
at the foot of the cross, and in November, 1817, he 
took an obscure country curacy in the North, where 
his indefatigable labors and affectionate heart won him 
the love of all his flock, especially the poor, but who 
could not appreciate his talents, nor " enter into the 
deep feelings of his soul." 

Here he labored, and here he loved to labor ; and 
would have died among the simple flock he loved for 
Christ's sake ; but his friends removed him to the sea- 
side at Cove. His sermons were but precepts of which 
he was a living example. His sickness and closing 
scene were replete with all that is lovely in the Chris- 
tian character. To his relatives who stood round him, 
he said, " the peace of God overshadow them, dwell in 
them, and reign over them ;" and to a relative who 
hung over him, he said, " Close this eye, the other is 
closed already — and now farewell." 

Thus this poet and Christian died, and thus is he 
buried, in that lonely deserted place, among the dead 
of almost every clime, who have been huddled and 
housed here, apart from country and kindred, and where 
few but strangers' feet ever tread the way to their iso- 
lated resting-place. 

There was something to me quite forbidding in the 
associations that hung around the grave of Charles 
Wolfe, in that deserted corner : — 



268 ANNALS OF THE 

u 0, breathe not his name, let him sleep in the shade, 
Where cold and unhonored his relics are laid ; 
Sad, silent, and dark be the tears that we shed, 
As the night dew that falls on the grass o'er his head." 

The summer of 1848 was pleasant and unusually 
sunny, and the hopes of the poor peasant revived as he 
saw the potato looking up again, in freshness and 
strength ; but alas ! a few clays laid all his prospects 
in the dust. 

A brother of Theobald Mathew had planted a field 
of twenty-seven acres, in almost certain faith that they 
would not be blasted ; for weeks they flourished, and 
promised to yield an abundant crop. The poor people 
in the neighborhood were blessing the good God for the 
beautiful patch of the " kind gintleman," and seemed 
as happy as though they were ripening for their own 
use. They have been known to go and look into the 
field, and take off their hats, and in humble adoration 
bless the name of God, for his great mercy in sending 
them the potato again. This was their usual practice 
when they saw a field looking vigorous. But in one 
night the spoiler came — this beautiful field in the morn- 
ing had, in isolated spots, the withering touch of the 
fatal disease. In a few days the rich extensive crop 
would not pay the laborer for his toil in gathering it. 
All was over, and in silent despondency each one 
submitted to the stroke. The " still small voice " 
seemed to say, " Be still, and know that I am God." 
It was something for which man could not reprove his 
brother ; and he dared not reproach his God. u And 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 269 

what," said an old woman, sitting by her vegetable 
stall, " would become of us miserable bodies, if God 
Almighty had sent the blast on us, and left the po- 
tato ?" 

This was in the autumn of 1845, when but a partial 
failure took place — the blast had not then fallen on man ; 
but it did fall, and swept them down as grass before 
the mower's scythe, yet not one of the victims, through 
long months of starvation, was heard to murmur against 
God. They thanked his holy name, both when they saw 
the potato grow in luxuriance, and when they saw it 
dried, as by a scorching heat. It was one of the most 
touching, striking features of the famine, to see a family 
looking into a withered patch, which the day before 
looked promising, and hear the exclamations of wonder 
and praise, weeping and thanksgiving, mingled to- 
gether, " He's sent the blast, blessed be his holy 
name !" " His blessed will be done — and we'll all die 
with hunger, and praise God we're all poor sinners," 
&c. They literally and practically carried out the 
principle of one in ancient days, who said, " Though 
he slay me, yet will I trust in him ;" for though year 
after year they saw the root on which they and their 
fathers had lived, melt away, yet they would not be 
persuaded but that the good God would give them the 
potato again ; and in 1846-7-8-9, when each succes- 
sive year had produced the same if not worse effects, 
they yet persisted in saving, oftentimes by stealth, 
some part of a sound potato, to keep it from the hun- 
gry mouths of their children, that they might put it in 



270 ANNALS OF THE 

the ground, and " Plaise God we will have the potato 
again," would be the persevering reply to all expostu- 
lation. So wedded are they to this root, that notwith- 
standing many know and deeply feel that it has been 
their rod of oppression, yet they emphatically " kiss 
the rod, and Him that hath appointed it ;" and could 
a decree now go forth that the potato should be restored 
to its pristine soundness and health, and that the 
present generation and their posterity forever should 
feed on this root exclusively, and have work six days 
a-week, at fourpence or sixpence a-clay, there would be 
a universal jubilee kept through mountain and glen, 
and bonfires would from hill-top to bog extinguish the 
light of moon and star, for many a joyful night. And 
let it be expected by those who would do good to Ire- 
land, and elevate her in the scale of being, that it will 
be many a long year before the sickle will be as joy- 
fully and heartily worked as the spade. This spade 
has a thousand associations, entwining in and about the 
hearts of parent and child, which no other instrument 
of husbandry can claim ; it has cut the turf that lighted 
up the mud-wall cabin, and boiled the " blessed po- 
tato ;" it has dug the pit in front of the cabin for the 
duck -pond ; it has piled the manure-heap at the cor- 
ner, mountain high ; it has planted the ridge which 
furnished their daily bread ; it has made the ditch, and 
repaired the road ; it has stood by the hearth or door 
through many a dark and stormy night, to guard the 
little stack for the cow against the tithe gatherer ; it 
has been a fireside and field-companion ; and above all, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 271 

and over all, it lias measured and hollowed out many a 
last sleeping bed for a darling child, a beloved husband 
or wife, and in the dark days of the famine it has often 
been the only companion to accompany the father, 
mother, husband, wife, or child, who has had the corpse 
of a hunger-stricken relative in a sack or tied to the 
back, to convey it to the dread uncoffined pit, where 
are tumbled, in horrid confusion, the starved dead of 
all ages. 

The sickle has not that claim to the affections of 
what is genteelly called the " lower order." It is more 
aristocratic in its station and occupation. It has been 
used in the hands of the poor, to reap down the fields 
of the rich a for naught;" it has cut the wheat and 
the barley for the tax-gatherer, the landlord, and the 
surpliced " hireling," who " reaps where he sowed 
not," and " gathers where he has not strewed." 

With all these considerations, it must be expected 
that this instrument will be approached with caution, 
if not suspicion ; and wonder not if they feel like David, 
when the armor of Saul was put on him, to go out and 
meet Goliath : " I cannot go with these, for I have not 
proved them." He who would reform, must not only 
know what is to be done, but how it is best to do it ef- 
fectually. The Irish will never be laughed or preached 
out of their relish for the potato, neither should it be 
attempted ; let them love it — let them cultivate it, but 
let it not be like the grass of the field for the bullock, 
who is adapted entirely to that food, and which has 
never failed to give him a supply. Learn the Irish by 



272 ANNALS OF THE 

use that they need not relish the potato less, but they 
may love the bread and other esculents more, that 
should one fail, they may turn to another with con- 
venience. Give them good healthy food as substitutes, 
and cast the musty, sour Indian meal, with the " black 
bread " away — frighten them not with sickening dan- 
gerous food, and tell them it is because they are dainty 
and savage that they do not relish it. If what is given 
them be " good enough for kings," then let kings eat 
it ; for if God has " made of one blood all the nations 
of the earth," he may have made the palate, too, some- 
what similar. If bread will strengthen John Russell's 
heart, it will the " bog-trotter's " also ; if a fine-spun 
broadcloth, with gilt buttons, becomes the backs of the 
Queen's ministers, then surely a coarser texture, with- 
out patch or rent, would not sit ungracefully on the 
shoulders of Paddy. Let him, if made in the image of 
God, be a man too ; and let him not be thought pre- 
suming, if he be one of the Queen's subjects, should he 
aspire to mediocrity among the humblest who call 
themselves so. If the Irish say most heartily, " Long 
live the Queen," let the Queen respond heartily, and 
" while I live I will do good to my Irish subjects." 
If the sixty-two mud-wall huts to each hundred in the 
worst parts, and twenty-three in the best, as Mr. 
Bright asserts, look a little untidy in an isle where 
castles and rich domains dot the green surface, why 
not substitute the comely cottage? and if the ma- 
nure-heap be unseemly to the eyes and unsavory to 
the nose, plant in its stead the vine and the rose — 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 273 

for be assured, in no isle of the sea will they bloom 
fairer. 

England has held this pretty gem of the ocean by 
the cable of king and queenship for centuries, floating 
and dashing alternately in the vascillating uncertain 
waves of hope and desperation, casting in oil when the 
tempest runs highest — pulling the cord gently, and 
whispering " Sister," when she finds her loosening her 
holdings to make for a more open sea ; and then pro- 
mises to repair her breaches, and make her to u sing 
as in the days of her youth." But there she is, rock- 
ing and floating still, her wild tresses disheveled, her 
head uncovered, and her feet still bare. One hundred 
and thirty years ago, she had one hundred and sixty 
families that had no chimneys in their hovels ; now she 
has sixty-two in one hundred not fit for man to inhabit 
in one part, and on an average of something like forty • 
four or forty-five through the whole island, from which 
the beaver and woodchuck might blush to be found 
peeping. Why, in the name of all that is common 
sense or common decency, if she cannot be remodeled, 
if she is rooted and grounded in her everlasting filth, 
her disgusting tatters, and frightful rags, is she not cut 
loose and left to sink or swim, as best she can manage 1 
If she can be transformed into anything like comeli- 
ness, why is she hung out a never-fading, never-dying 
scarecrow to all the world beside? If the last four 
years have not turned her inside out, and shown her, 
in the face of heaven, to the nations of the earth — if 
any deformity remains which is yet to be served up, 
12* 



274 ANNALS OF THE 

for one, I pray, " have me excused." If England by 
this time do not know of what sort this her " sis- 
ter island" is, if she do not understand either her 
disease or her cure, all may be given up as lost, for 
until " the elements shall melt with fervent heat," the 
earth disclose her slain, and the " sea give up her 
dead," can any more that is forbidding, revolting, and 
even terrific, be held out to the world, than has that 
island presented for ages gone by ; and if she is loved, 
why not cherish her 1 if hated, why not wholly cast 
her off ? 

To the words of the faithful, fearless, warm-hearted 
John Bright, let the philanthropist respond — " Aboli- 
tion of primogeniture for underived property — registry 
of property — reduction of the enormous charges for 
stamps for the sale and purchase of land — security of 
tenure for the practical laborers of the soil — abolition 
of the Established Church in Ireland — extension of 
the suffrage — and reinforcement of the representature 
in the Imperial Parliament. 

" If the aristocracy of the United Kingdom have 
heaped evils unnumbered upon Ireland, why should not 
the people of the United Kingdom make ample restitu- 
tion V And let all the people rise, and say in one 
united doxology, " Amen, so let it be." 

WATER CURE. 

While lingering in and about Cork, among all its 
gardens and pleasant walks, a spot two miles from 
Blarney Castle, well known for the past five years as 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 275 

the " Water Cure" establishment, kept by Dr. Bar- 
ter, should not be passed over in silence. The Doctor 
has persevered through and over all prejudices, suffi- 
cient to make the place a very desirable one on many 
accounts. Its location is well chosen, standing on an 
airy, sightly eminence, looking down upon the rich 
vales and woods of Blarney, its own backwoods left, 
with the exception of a few foot-paths and seats, to 
its natural wildness ; its picturesque bathing-house or 
cottage, and its cultivated farm, of which the Doctor 
is the principal manager, make it, taken as a whole, a 
place of interesting resort. The house for patients is 
large and pleasant, its inmates made up of such as 
have hope if not faith, that plunging and dipping, 
showering and drinking cold water, possesses special, if 
not super-excellencies in the healing way, when applied 
scientifically, more than when old Dame Nature, in 
her homespun manner, tells them to drink when they 
are thirsty, and wash when they are smutty. His 
terms are calculated better for the purses of the higher 
classes than for the poorer sort, consequently he does 
not keep a hospital of charity, and those who resort 
there for a time, find good intelligent company, and 
when not made into mummies, or ducking and sweating, 
can walk or ride, read or chat, as they may find it 
most congenial. The table is abundantly supplied 
with eatables, so that flesh-eaters as well as anti-flesh- 
eaters may have all they can rationally ask, the only 
prohibition being tea and coffee. Many have tested 
the efficacy and declared it good, and it would seem 



276 ANNALS OF THE 

impossible that a summer could be passed on that 
mountain, with the pure breezes of Ireland fanning the 
blood, and the sparkling water kissing the skin, and 
not be " cured of whatever disease he had," if the dis- 
ease had not passed the healing art. 

The Doctor is a great agriculturist, and if he had 
the bogs and hunting-grounds made over to him, fam- 
ine if not pestilence would vanish from that rich soil. 
He thinks much and talks when disposed, and is physi- 
ologist enough to know that flesh and gravies are not 
the food suited to the system of any invalid ; yet with 
a desire to please, or to retain invalids in his house, he 
practices these inconsistencies, as he candidly acknowl- 
edges them. 

A week was pleasantly passed in the house and upon 
the premises ; and were a spot preeminently happy for 
everything needful and social to be chosen, that might 
be the one to meet all cases. Whoever is devotional 
may have his Bible and prayers ; whoever is merry may 
have psalms and the piano ; whoever wants exercise 
may find battledoors, swings, and woody walks ; and 
whoever wants bathing can find bathing-tubs, and cold 
or warm water. 



A funeral under any circumstances, or among any 
people, whether Christian or pagan, has a solemnity 
which casts a shade, for a moment at least, over all 
levity ; and never probably in war or peace, in pomp 
or destitution, among civilized or uncivilized, was there 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 



277 



a procession bearing to its last home a body from which 
the soul had fled, which did not produce on the minds 
of the multitude a check if not a reflection, that the 
" deep, damp vault," where the departed is about to 
be shut from the light of the world and the converse of 
his fellow-men, was a mysterious hiding-place, into 
which secret the souls of the living did not wish to 
enter. 

It was about midsummer on a sunny morning, when 
looking from the door of William Martin, in Cork, a 
procession unexpectedly moved before my vision, and 
never in the short space of a moment did more painful 
and pleasant remembrances pass in review. Painful, 
because were again presented the friends, who in my 
native land, one by one as they departed, rose in suc- 
cession before me, and because I knew there were sor- 
rowing hearts in that train — and mine well knew the 
pangs of such ; but pleasant, because in the come- 
ly throng, who with slow and solemn step measured the 
distance, the unnatural custom which mock fashion has 
introduced was not manifest. Woman was in that 
procession, precisely the procession where she belongs 
— woman, whose heart emphatically can " weep with 
those that weep," — woman, who loves to the last, and 
acts to the last ; why, tell us why, should she not fol- 
low to the narrow, dark house, the relative she has 
cherished, or the neighbor she has valued and loved ; 
the friend with whom she may have taken " sweet 
counsel, and walked to the house of God in company V 9 
Why should she not go " in company" now " to the 



278 ANNALS OF THE 

house appointed for all living," and where she shall, 
in her own due time, be transported 1 Pleasant, too, 
because the vain trappings of hireling undertakers, 
" nodding plumes," mourning horses and black hearses 
were not there. It was simply and truly a Friend's 
funeral. 

Not stopping to inquire the name or age of the de- 
ceased, or who would accompany me, I crossed the 
street and joined the procession. Like the burial in 
the city of Nain eighteen hundred years ago, " much 
people of the city" were there. A mile or more 
through the town, gave time for that reflection so suita- 
ble and profitable when the soul is necessarily sum- 
moned to the face of that " King of Terrors 1 " and 
there interrogated as to its present state and future 
destiny. Slowly and silently the entrance to that in- 
closure, where the dead were congregated, was opened 
and passed ; and as with the pen of a diamond was 
that panorama impressed on my eye and heart. It 
was a square of smooth green, with the exception of 
the unpretending hillocks, which without a stone told 
that the dead lay there. The whole inclosure was 
surrounded by trees of rich summer foliage ; these, as 
they waved gracefully over the wall, shed a trembling 
shadow upon the emerald covering of the beds of the 
sleeping, and the still house of death was quietly ap- 
proached, and every member of that Society sat down 
together to this mourning feast, and there in solemn 
sweet silence waited to hear what God would say. The 
narrow bed was open before them — the plain coffin that 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 279 

inclosed the body of the dead was waiting to enter — an 
interval of some thirty minutes of solemn silence was 
broken by a cleep-toned measured voice ; and never be- 
fore did the words, " Blessed are the dead that die in 
the Lord," so sweetly, so solemnly, so unearthly, fall 
on my ear — as if standing on the Isle of Patmos, the 
voice that spake to John, seemed to reverberate through 
that assembly, that to me appeared as if already stand- 
ing on " Mount Zion before the Lamb." The sen- 
tences were short and pithy, and from them I ascer- 
tained that the departed before us was an aged female, 
who had fulfilled as a faithful hireling her day, and 
had come to the grave " like a shock of corn fully 
ripe." He praised her not in studied eulogiums — he 
held her not up between us and the Lamb who re- 
deemed her, as a bright pattern for our imitation ; but 
he said deeply and emphatically, " Yea, they rest from 
their labors and their works do follow them." He 
dwelt a moment on that sweet rest prepared for the 
people of God, and if any were there who had not 
entered into it, surely they must then have felt a de- 
sire. 

He was followed by one who addressed the Majesty 
of heaven with that adoration which always marks the 
manner of one whose supplications emanate from the 
deep working of the Holy Spirit within the soul, and 
that speaks because it feels, and feels because it has 
something to feel. It was done — the coffin was care- 
fully let down to its long resting-place — " Dust to 
dust " met, green sod was fitly placed on her breast, 



280 ANNALS OF THE 

nor was the silence in the least broken till all had 
passed the inclosure. 

I would not exchange that hour for a thousand dinner 
parties of fashionable professors, or pompous burials of 
the titled great, who have lived but to be honored, and 
whose true epitaph could only be — 

" He lived and died." 

The time was drawing nigh when effects must be 
gathered, and Cork must be left. The season had 
been spent most pleasantly and profitably, for culti- 
vated minds were ever at hand, and hospitable boards 
were always made welcome. To designate who was 
the kindest, would be a difficulty wholly uncalled for, 
as all and every one were more than courteous. Just- 
ice compels an acknowledgment of one distinguished 
favor, which was and is more prized for the manner in 
which it was done. The Irish, I have before remarked, 
are in their habit of giving, most nobly removed from 
an ostentatious display, or from a manner which makes 
the recipient feel that he is so deeply indebted that he 
can never be discharged. 

In the year 1845, I stopped in the house of Mrs. 
Fisher, who generously refused any compensation ; 
when the second visit was made to that city, I again 
took lodgings with her, determining to pay ; but as she 
was generous in the first instance, I did not inquire 
terms, lest she might suppose it an indirect suggestion 
for a second gift. On my departure the bill was called 
for, fifteen weeks' uncontrolled access to drawing-room 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 281 

or parlor, and good lodging. Not a shilling was de- 
manded and not a shilling would she accept. This was 
hospitality, apparently " without grudging," and cer- 
tainly without display. 

I sailed from that harbor with a heart full of grati- 
tude to all with whom I had been conversant, and full 
of sorrow, that my eyes would never again see those 
kind friends who had made my stay so pleasant, and 
the last farewell of the kind Theobald Mathew, and 
the hospitable, intelligent Beales, who were ready at 
the packet, was the finishing touch to sensations already 
too pressing upon me. 

The captain had generously given my passage, and 
ordered the steward to see that all and everything was 
prepared for my comfort. This, by my own negligence, 
or in some other way, was not performed, and the night 
to me was a sad one. When all had stepped on shore, 
and the ring of the packet bell died on the ear, I sat 
down upon the side of the vessel, and with feelings 
much like those when sailing out of New York, a pas- 
sive, stoical indifference, amounting almost to selfish- 
ness, passed over me ; and I turned away, and could 
not or would not look upon the sweet hills that hung 
over the Lee, and scarcely did I see the wave of the 
handkerchiefs on that lovely South Terrace, as the 
steamer sailed, where I had enjoyed so much. The 
passage was rough, the wind high, and the night long, 
cold and dreary. Wrapping my cloak about me, I had 
reclined under a little awning on the deck, not once 
asking for a berth in the cabin, and not till a stranger 



282 ANNALS OF THE 

aroused me, and said, " It is both imprudent and late 
to be stopping here," did my stupor leave me in the 
least. Then it "was too late to find a bed, and the re- 
mainder of the night was passed as uncomfortably as it 
commenced. 

It was not wholly the parting with kind friends, or 
shutting my eyes forever on waters, flowers, rich val- 
leys and hills, that so unnerved me ; but it was Ire- 
land, that land of song and of sorrow, that I was leav- 
ing forever. It was Ireland, where I had been so 
strangely sent, so strangely preserved, and to which I 
was so strangely linked, by sights of suffering and un- 
paralleled woe. It was Ireland that was still drinking 
that fathomless cup of misery extreme, whose bottom 
has yet never been sounded, and whose brim is still 
running over, welling up and oozing out, in spite of 
long and deep draughts continually tasted. The visitor 
among strangers, who is receiving tokens of kindness 
and presents of remembrance, in the routine of other 
engagements may not examine and appreciate all in 
possession, till the hurry is past, the visit ended ; and 
then coolly and calmly the parcel is opened, and every 
memento, however valuable or trifling, has a just esti- 
mate, if judgment be competent to the task. My par- 
cel was left untouched that night ; passive, enduring, 
as if covered suddenly by an avalanche, which only left 
room for breathing, with no room for struggling, was 
all that could effectually be done. 

The morning found me in Dublin ; and here new 
trials were in waiting. My trunk, containing nearly 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 283 

all that was valuable in wearing apparel, was left in the 
care of the poor woman where I had lodged through the 
winter. She had before been intrusted with it, and 
her honesty had never been doubted. Her husband 
had become intemperate, and she had been placed in 
this great house by the landlady to keep it, and wait 
on lodgers, who paid her what they saw fit. The 
lodgers had left, all but one, and she had no resources ; 
her children, three in number, were crying for bread. 
She went to the trunk, took a dress, and carried it to 
one of the nuisances — a pawnbroker's — and procured 
bread. She took a second and third, until the trunk 
was emptied of garments to the number of fourteen, to- 
gether with a few valuable books and other etceteras, 
among which was a silver teaspoon, which had seen 
nearly half a century, and had been the admiration 
of many a Connaught and Kerry wight, when sitting 
with them around the basket of potatoes. This, 
which was carried in my pocket, wrapped in clean pa- 
per, served for knife and fork, tea-cup, plate, and sau- 
cer, during every tour over mountain and bog. Blessed 
companion ! it had become " part and parcel " of my- 
self ; beside it was a true born American, and had an 
indenture made by an agonized child when in the act 
of taking medicine. Sacred relic ! 

Bridget met me at the door — the usual gladness and 
hearty salutation were wanting. " How are you, 
Bridget, and how are the children?" was answered 
by, " Bad enough, God knows ; and bad luck to you." 
What luck to me 1" " Your clothes are gone, and I 



u 



284 ANNALS OF THE 

couldn't help it." Not in the least suspecting her in- 
tegrity, the natural inquiry was, " Has the house been 
robbed 1" Frankly, she replied, "No, but I have 
taken them ; my children were starving with hunger ; 
I found the trunk open, which a painter who went into 
the chamber opened, as I supposed. You had long 
been gone, it was uncertain when you would return, 
and I might and should redeem them in a few weeks, 
and they are all in the pawn." The cause and effect 
were both before me in a true light, and the question 
is left to mothers, how they might have acted in a case 
like this. She had heard me say that life was more 
valuable than property, and when that was in peril, 
property became the moral right of him who had tried 
every expedient to save life, but especially when the 
taking of it did not threaten the same condition of that 
in which he was placed. She had said, " I will never 
see my children die for bread ; I will work, T will beg, 
and when neither will do, I would go and stand on that 
bridge (which was under the window), and if asking 
would not do, I would seize the first that my hands 
could wrench from any one passing." She had flung 
me back on my principles, by acting up to hers, and 
what could be said. She could have been transported ; 
and the whole city, who knew the affair, and had never 
been hungry, neither entered into her starving case nor 
pitied me for my foolish forbearance. The rich land- 
lady who had recommended hereto me coolly said she 
would put her out of the house, and she did so ; and I 
found poor Bridget in a miserable hovel, with no means 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 285 

of support, and regretted that the landlady had ever 
known the circumstance. All the garments but one 
were found, but many of them too mildewed to be worth 
redeeming ; the missing one was the best, and doubt- 
less was taken by the painter. But the spoon — ah, 
the lucky spoon ! It is now in a closet, where I am 
sitting, in London, doubly, yes, trebly valued for its 
extensive travels and fortunate escapes. I look at it, 
and think of the peasant children, and the potato, and 
poor Bridget and the pawnbroker. 

The reader is left to name this tale " Lights " or 
" Shades " of Ireland, as best suits his principles ; for 
myself, in my heart, I could not pronounce the woman 
a thief, and would as soon have trusted her in all com- 
mon cases after this as before, and am glad that her 
children did not starve when my garments were lying 
useless. 

The time for a little review of the past, and prepara- 
tion for the future, had now come. Ireland had been 
explored, and England was in prospect. The Ameri- 
cans had written that the last donation was on the 
ocean, and probably no more would be sent. Why 
should my stay be protracted ; for the inward voice 
was continually urging, " I have finished the work that 
thou gavest me to do." Far, far be it from me to say 
that this work was well finished ; many, many mistakes 
might be corrected, but this I would candidly and hum- 
bly say, they were not willful, but ignorant or misjudg- 
ing ones. So faithful was conscience in her scrutiniz- 
ing, that hours, yes days, when sitting alone in a chain- 



286 ANNALS OF THE 

ber at Richard Webb's, preparing for London, she 
would ask, and earnestly too, Had I done what I 
could 1 — had I not sometimes consulted my own ease 1 
— had I labored to the extent, with hands, feet, money, 
tongue, pen, and influence, to do, by little or by great 
means, what my Master had required 1 — had I not 
sometimes, when condemning the whisky- drinking and 
wine-bibbing of the clergy and gentry, spent a penny 
on some little relish to take with my bread, when that 
penny would have given a poor laboring man a pound 
of meal, and my bread could have been taken without 
it ? had I not burned a candle an hour, when neither 
reading or working, or put an additional piece of turf 
on the grate, when the poor, sick, dying cabiners had 
not either 1 — had I not paid a shilling for riding, when 
my feet were able for the journey % But above all, that 
trunk of clothes ! When packing it to leave, the ques- 
tion was suggested, Is not this laying up treasures on 
earth % and should " moth corrupt," or " thieves break 
through and steal," my hoarding would be justly re- 
buked. I had often thought, as the last alternative, of 
selling everything for bread to give the starving, that 
could possibly be spared, without leaving myself in a 
suffering state. This had not been done, the clothes 
were hoarded, and the virtual thieves — the pawnbrokers 
— had taken if not stolen them. This was followed by 
the startling passage, " If thine own conscience con- 
demn thee, God is greater than thy conscience, and 
knoweth all things." Oh ! what searching of heart is 
there contained in the Holy Scriptures. Then again — 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 287 

had I by precept and example presented Christ, and so 
walked in Him that all who saw me took knowledge 
that I had learned of Him ? — had the words of eternal 
life been read and explained in every place where God 
gave me ability and opportunity, as might have been — 
had I been as faithful in rebuking the sins of the great, 
where opportunity presented, as I had those of the 
mean and despised ? — had " a gift ever blinded my 
eyes," to lead me unjustly to favor the giver, and had 
the kindly heartfelt welcomes of the poor been as grate- 
ful in some lowly mud cabin, and the humble invitation 
to a dinner of potatoes as flattering as the polished sal- 
utations of the rich, with the proffered arm of the mas- 
ter of the feast to sit down to a sumptuous table with 
honorable invited guests? Had I rejoiced with "ex- 
ceeding great joy," when my name had been cast out 
as evil, when reviled, and all manner of evil falsely 
said against me ? — had that legacy of long standing and 
sure title been as salutary and as gratefully received, 
as would have been a bequest from the government, for 
sacrifices made for the poor ? All this and more sunk 
deep, and remained long, when conscience arraigned 
me for rendering the stewardship of that four years' 
labor. " What hast thou done with thy Lord's mon- 
ey?" Ah! what indeed? Has a portion been given 
to u seven, and also to eight?" — has the bread been 
cast upon the waters ; and shall I find it after many 
days ? To the cross I flee, there let me hide — simply, 
simply, solely there I cling. 

Turning from myself, and the retrospect of the past 



288 ANNALS OF THE 

four years, the coming out from Cork, at the last and 
almost finishing touch of the whole, presented, Theobald 
Mathew, with the impression made on my mind, when 
he stood on the dock, by the packet, on the Lee, as the 
vessel sailed away. His countenance is a marked one, 
and would be distinguished as such in a crowd of 
strangers. But grief and blasted hopes have so scathed 
his warm heart, that though he retains that benignity 
of expression so peculiarly his own, yet the pencil of 
sorrow has so shaded it, continued anxiety has so para- 
lyzed that hope which ever is, and ever must be the 
wellspring of the soul, that there seems a trembling 
doubting in every feature, whether to settle into a de- 
sponding passiveness, or struggle to maintain that wont- 
ed complacency which has seemed an innate and insep- 
arable part of his whole constitution. The scourge 
that has laid waste his people has withered, has scathed 
his very soul. He stood " between the living and the 
dead," like a Phineas, till the plague was measurably 
stayed, when, in letting go his strained grasp, he found, 
he felt that his own hand had been weakened, and 
though he complained not, he saw, he knew that many 
who had cried " Hosanna," if they did not say " cru- 
cify him, crucify him," would turn away and walk no 
more with him. The palsy that shook his body was a 
faint shadow of the pals} 7 " that withered the springs of 
his heart, and dried up the life-blood of his soul. 
Great as was his goodness, and good as was his great- 
ness, they neither of them had power to sustain a fabric 
whose framework was gentleness and confiding love. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 289 

When the blast swept over him, and he felt his feet 
sliding, he reached out his believing hand to the sup- 
ports he thought near him — they were gone ! It was 
then that the " iron entered into his soul," — it was 
then that he found that l8ve dies with money, and 
popularity thrives best when its hand is fullest, and 
needs it the least ; — it was then that he found experi- 
mentally that benevolence must be content with its own 
reward, till the " time of the restitution of all things," 
when every man shall be rewarded according to his 
works ; and that though he might have given " all his 
goods to feed the poor," his recompense in return from 
his fellow man might only be, " Who hath required 
this at your hands V J W T hen a man is in trouble and 
his feet are fast sliding, the prompt inquiry is, " What 
brought him here ? — Has he been industrious, has he 
been honest, has he been temperate 1" But when lie is 
in prosperity, and the tide of fortune flows smoothly, 
who inquires whether he honestly, industriously, or 
soberly acquired this prosperity ? Who stands aloof 
from sharing his honors, which flow from his abundance, 
lest these honors come from an abundance too unjusthy 
acquired 1 Has he robbed the poor and despoiled the 
widow and fatherless to fill his granaries and decorate 
his halls ? Who has any right to investigate that 1 — 
Let every man mind his own business, is the rebuke. 
Theobald Mathew was in debt — how came he there 7 
Why everybody knew it was not to aggrandize himself ; 
but he is in debt — he must have been imprudent if not 
dishonest ! True, he was, as the world calls it, in 

10 
O 



290 ANNALS OF THE 

debt, but virtually he owes no man anything — the world 
never has, the world never will, the world never can re- 
pay him ; his debt is giving to the poor, when the poor 
were dying, what he then thought was justly his own, 
and justly tangible ; and tnat depravity is to be pitied 
that imputes blame to generosity like this — a generosity 
which seeks not its own, but the good of those that are 
ready to perish. He loved his country — he loved his 
fellow-man of every. clime, and his whole life has been 
spent in seeking their good. When he saw the world 
had misunderstood him, then he suffered unutterable 
things ; and the shock that both body and mind sus- 
tained has left an impress that throws a constraint upon 
that full freedom which his real friends have been wont 
to exercise toward him ; so abstracted does his mind at 
times appear, that it is sometimes difficult to know 
either what chord to touch or what time to strike it, 
lest the unostentatious sensibilities of his heart should 
be awakened afresh to painful sensations. 

God preserve him, as well as all others, who live for 
the world and its benefit. The current of man's heart 
must run in a different channel before it can render at 
all times even blessing for blessing, and better is he 
treated than was his Master, if the question do not ap- 
ply to him also, " Many good works have I shown you ; 
for which of these works do you stone me V 9 The last 
famine has drawn out the true character of the people 
there, in a light most favorable to be understood ; it 
has shown what is in man, by a dissection of almost 
every part of his system, and they never can hide again 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 291 

as they have done, and the great pity is, that amid so 
much upturning there has been so little cleansing. 
True, the pool has not yet become quiescent, nor the 
sediment had time to settle ; and when it shall, many 
that were " filthy will be filthy still," and those that 
were " righteous will be righteous still." 

Though truth must and will triumph, judgment some- 
times long delays, and the accusations against the na- 
tion of that island have a foundation in truth, yet the 
perverted judgment of men have so misapplied them, 
that at present the force they contain falls almost pow- 
erless. That there is injustice there cannot be denied, 
and this injustice has often been exercised by those who 
would have been least suspected. The famine, in spite 
of all evasions, has told some singular tales of this. 
The liberality of all nations has been most shamefully 
abused there, but the poor were not in the fault, and 
yet the poor must and do suffer all the sad conse- 
quences ; for now, while the wail of woe and death is 
still going up in many parts, the response is neither 
money nor bread, but " they have been ungrateful, they 
have been dishonest, and we are tired of hearing of Ire- 
land." And were I to speak from honest conviction of 
what passed there, in much of the distributions belong- 
ing to government, and much from other places, that 
went through paid hands, had it been cast into the sea, 
the fishes might have been better benefited than were 
the starving ; but to private donors, and to the churches 
of England, and the laboring classes, who intrusted 
their offerings to isolated churches and isolated almoners 



292 ANNALS OF THE 

of their gifts, without fee or reward, let it be said, their 
donations in most cases were well applied, and greatly 
blessed. I have known, and record it with pleasure, 
that when a church there, from one here, was presented 
with money, clothing, or food, the minister of that 
church would divide it among such men and women as 
cheerfully sought out and supplied the most needy, with 
the utmost integrity. Many felt apparently that it 
was the Lord's .money in very deed, and belonged to 
the Lord's poor, and that they must renders strict ac- 
count of their stewardship ; and had one half even that 
the government sent been withheld, and the other half 
intrusted to such hands, as managed with like discre- 
tion and honesty, many more lives would have been 
saved, and less complaint of ingratitude been made. 

It must be seen that the work was a most arduous 
and difficult one, and it takes much less time and trou- 
ble to sit quietly at home and dictate how it should be 
done, or complain when it is finished how badly it was 
executed, than it would to have gone in person and per- 
formed the task. It was a hurried work — the four 
millions of starving men, women, and children were 
calling for food to-day, they were calling in earnest, 
they could not wait days, and possibly weeks, till the 
honesty of a landlord, or the integrity of a rector, should 
go through the trial of a jury ; they pould not stand 
round the doors of a church or chapel, waiting the de- 
cision of bishops and clergymen, priests and monks, 
whether the bread taken in commemoration of the 
Lord's death, were transformed into a part or whole of 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 293 

his real body or not, before they could have a piece of 
it ; consequently, what was to be clone must be clone 
quickly, and in the kindly feelings which promptly 
lighted up, the givers would naturally and properly 
throw promiscuously whatever relief could be gathered 
by any hands that would offer. The government of 
England might possibly have dozed a little too long, 
regardless of what these her thriving landlords in that 
green isle were doing ; they might not have precisely 
understood how they were feeding, housing, and pay- 
ing their serfs that were squatting " lazily ' ? upon their 
soil ; they might not have applied the laws of mind 
precisely to this point, that these laws possess the un- 
varying principle of fixing deeply and firmly in the 
heart of the oppressor a hatred toward the being that 
he has unjustly coerced, and the very degradation to 
which he has reduced him becomes the very cause of 
his aversion toward him. Therefore such landlords, 
when famine pressed sorely upon their unpaid tenants, 
would necessarily by this law pity least, and neglect 
most, those who by accidental circumstances might be 
in greatest want. Those full-fed, government-paid cler- 
gymen, who had learned the law of love through her 
own bread and wine exclusively, and whose jaundiced 
eyes saw dark and foul spots on all her surplices but 
her own, would be quick to discern that the " curse 
causeless does not come ;" and that as the Roman 
Catholics embodied the majority of the sufferers in Ire- 
land, and the Roman Catholics were mostly fed on po- 
tatoes, and as God had blasted these potatoes, there- 



294 ANNALS OF THE 

fore they ought in humble acquiescence to say, " amen !" 
while the smoke of this torment was ascending, if not 
be willing co-workers with God in the infliction of the 
punishment. When such did give what was intrusted 
to their hands, it was not always given " with cheer- 
fulness," or without what they thought a merited re- 
buke. " Don't you see now," said a pert wife of a 
curate of this class, " don't you see what your idolatry 
has brought upon you ;" handing a starving woman 
tauntingly a little food ; " you've been told that some- 
thing dreadful would come upon you long before, but 
you would not believe ; now are you ready to come out 
of that church'?" " How," said a bystander, "could 
you speak so unkindly to that poor starving suppliant 
at your door ; should you like the same treatment un- 
der the same circumstances V " I should deserve it ; 
and beside, how could I see her die under those awful 
delusions 1" " Would it not be better to show her 
Christ, and try to direct her to him'?" "Christ! 
how can she understand anything of him, while in that 
church V 

This is not a fac-simile of all in the government 
church, neither is it an isolated case. Another in- 
stance only shall be named, and it is named as an illus- 
tration of the spirit that was too much in exercise there, 
and how it acted upon the sufferers : — 

A poor man, with a numerous family, applied to a 
rector of the Established Church for a portion of the 
donations committed to his care for the parish. 
" Where do you go to church V* was the question. 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 295 

" I am a Catholic," the man answered. " Ah, yes, 
give your soul to the priest, and come here for me to 
feed your body ; go back, and get your bread where 
you get your teaching." " This will learn 'em," said 
the exulting sexton of the church, who related the inci- 
dent, " this will learn 'em where they are." The pcor 
man went away without relief, though he belonged to 
the parish, and had a claim. Turning them over to 
the priests was the worst part of the spirit ; for the 
priests, in the first place, were not a government-paid 
people, and in the next, they had at that time no dona- 
tions intrusted to them ; and to tantalize a hungry man 
with that retort, was like hanging him in gibbets, and 
then telling him to eat bread. 

Such treatment was calculated not only to drive the 
poor to all sorts of intrigue, but to make them hate still 
more a religion that they always supposed to be false. 
The question which the Quaker put to the rector could 
well apply here, when he remarked that no good would 
be done to the Papists in Ireland while they rejected the 
Bible — " What good, friend, has thy Bible done thee?" 
Ah, true ; what good does it do any who practice not 
its spirit 1 It is not intended to imply, by these state- 
ments, that the clergy of the Established Church in 
Ireland, during the famine, were all bigots, or all hard- 
hearted, and without any true Christianity ; but it is 
intended to say, that the spirit of bigotry and partiality 
was there, and wherever manifested, whether by that 
religious party or any other, had a most unfavorable 
effect both on the bodies and minds of the suffering. 



296 ANNALS OF THE 

The government could not control that, any more 
than a crazy inebriate can help doing what he is 
tempted to do ; but the inebriate, when he is sober, 
should keep so, and not put himself in the power of an 
enemy that can injure him so much ; and if the expe- 
rience of two or three centuries in Ireland have not 
proved that carnal weapons are not needed in a church, 
and that Christ, who should be the head of it, has no 
occasion for them, surely they must be dull learners. 

The Christian may despair of conquest when kind- 
ness and love have no effect, and in the famine, when 
these were exercised, they were felt and acknowledged. 
Let airy stranger, in the year 1850, go into every parish 
in that country, and make investigation of the true 
state of feeling, as it would naturally flow out without 
any design ; and if that stranger made no party allu- 
sions that should awaken jealousy, he would hear lavish 
blessings bestowed on dissenters of every grade, where 
these dissenters had manifested a kindly feeling. " And 
there's the rector that would do the heart good," — 
" There's the blessed minister, that's worth the day's 
walk to hear his discourse," — " And would ye see the 
lady that's the blessin' to the poor ?" &c. Do you 
say this is selfishness? — it is a just appreciation of 
right and wrong ; and where right is not exercised why 
should it be acknowledged 1 What gospel requires 
that a man should say of an unjust neighbor that he 
walks uprightly, lest some evil-eyed partisan should 
judge him by his own narrow spirit 1 And blinded as 
the world is by sin, and perverted as education maybe, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 297 

there are things done which will bear looking in the 
face without blushing ; there are things done so well 
that an enemy, however skillful, could not improve 
them; and there are fallen men and women in the 
lower ranks of life, without any refinement of educa- 
tion, that can appreciate these well done things and 
even do them too ; and with all the zigzag movements in 
the famine there were some redeeming qualities, there 
were some things carried on and carried through, which 
were not accused of sectarianism, for the simplest rea- 
son — none was manifest. 

The Society of Friends justly merit this acknowledg- 
ment, and they have it most heartily from every por- 
tion of Ireland. Not belonging to that Society, my 
opportunity of testing the true feeling of the poor was 
a good one, and when in a school or soup-shop, the ques- 
tion was put— r-Who feeds you ? or, who sends you these 
clothes 1 the answer was : " The good Quakers, lady, 
and it's they that have the religion entirely." One 
young man seriously inquired of me, what sort of peo- 
ple they might be, and if their religion were like any 
other, and where they got sich a good one ; " By dad, 
don't you think it's the best in the world V It cer- 
tainly produces good works among the poor of Ireland, 
was the reply. " And where may they say their pray- 
ers % I wish I could hear 'em ;" or, " don't they say 
prayers'?" He pressed so closely, that vague answers 
would not avail ; the foundation of a faith which was so 
diiierent from what he had seen in any people, as he said, 
u mtirely," he determined to make out ; and finally 
18* 



298 ANNALS OF THE 

inquired if they suffered persons of other faith to see 
them worship ; and added, " I should like to see it." 
He was directed to a meeting in Dublin which was 
open on that day, and after getting all preliminaries as 
to how he must behave, he ventured in. 

The meeting was a silent one ; he saw no altars, he 
heard no prayers, and his astonishment at their wor- 
ship was equal to his admiration of their goodness. 
" And wasn't it quare they didn't spake ?" " They 
were waiting in silence till they should have something 
given them to speak." This increased the difficulty, 
and he went away perfectly confounded, wishing he 
could know something more about them, " for they 
must be a blessed people." 

This simple-minded lad lived in a remote part 
of Ireland, had never been in a city before ; and he 
said that he had seen these good people in the moun- 
tains giving alms, and " didn't they spake so kindly," 
he added, " I intended to see 'em if I could find where 
they stopped." Simple-minded youth, what could he 
do more % 

Whilst writing this, a report has been sent me of 
the Birr Mission, at Parsonstown in Ireland, under the 
superintendence of Mr. Carlisle, and I happily find by 
the following extract this fresh proof of the effect of 
kindness on the hearts of the most bigoted. 

The Report states : " The medical coadjutor of the 
Mission, noticed in our last Report as having been sent 
to us from Edinburgh, continues his labors most assid- 
uously and most usefully. Nothing has done so much 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 299 

toward removing the prejudices of Roman Catholics 
against us — even those who formerly were most opposed 
and most bigoted — as his kind, unwearied, and skillful 
attention to the sick poor. It has already opened the 
way for the word of God to many families from which 
it formerly was debarred ; and we observe that the pre- 
judices of a class of society above the poor, with whom 
he has no direct intercourse in the way of his profession, 
are giving way before this kind and conciliatory ap- 
proach to the population generally." 

Were there space in these pages, like instances 
might be multiplied, and two which come under my no- 
tice were so in point, that they are entitled to a record 
in a better place. 

A few miles north of Dublin, in the winter of 1847 
and 1848, a minister of the Independent church was 
sick for weeks, and his life seemed suspended in doubt 
for some days. One Sabbath, in a chapel, after the 
morning service was finished, the priest called the at- 
tention of the people to his case, and added, "If he 
dies, God will take from us one of the best men in the 
country, and who will fill his place ? All we can do is 
to pray for him, and surely jgvl will all do that." 
Voices were loud in responding, yes, yes ; and they 
tarried another hour and went through their prayers for 
the sick. Now, as inefficient as these prayers might 
be, they were the legitimate offspring of kindness and 
goodwill which this minister had practiced, till he had 
not only removed prejudice, but had substituted like 
feelings of kindness. 



300 ANNALS OF THE 

The second case was that of a good woman, who he- 
longed to the Methodist denomination. She had been 
a pattern of good works in her neighborhood, without 
regard to party ; and the poor loved her as their long- 
tried friend. She died. The priest of the parish was 
noted for his peace-making spirit and liberality. The 
Sabbath after this good woman's death, he concluded 
the exercises of the day by naming the circumstance, 
and saying, " When God takes such good ones from 
the earth as this woman was, the living have not only 
cause to mourn, but to tremble, lest that his anger has 
gone out against the inhabitants, and He will not suffer 
such righteous ones to live among them." 

In a few weeks from this, that priest died, the hus- 
band of the good woman just named dropped an obit- 
uary notice in a paper which he edited, mentioning the 
conciliatory disposition of the priest, and 'his exertions 
in the parish to keep peace. A nephew of this priest 
called a few days after and thanked the editor for the 
kind notice, saying, " it was more than he could ex- 
pect." In two weeks from this an obituary of the ne- 
phew was inserted in the same paper. But mark the 
effects of simply carrying out the principle of Christian 
kindness ! Was Christ dishonored — was Christ of- 
fended 1 

PROSELYTISM. 

It requires the Irish language to provide suitable 
words for a suitable description of the spirit which is 
manifested in some parts to proselyte, by bribery, the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 301 

obstinate Romans to the church which has been her 
instrument of oppression for centuries. The English 
language is too meager to delineate it in the true light. 
Rice, Indian meal, and black bread would, if they had 
tongues, tell sad and ludicrous tales. The artless chil- 
dren too, who had not become adepts in deceit, would 
and did sometimes by chance tell the story, in short 
and pithy style. It was a practice by some of the 
zealous of this class, to open a school or schools, and 
invite those children who were in deep want to attend, 
and instruction, clothes, and food should be given, on 
the simple terms of reading the scriptures and attend- 
ing the church. The church catechism must be re- 
hearsed as a substitute for the Romish, and though in 
substance a passage or two looked as if the hoof of the 
so-called " beast, " might have been over it and left a 
modest track, yet by its adherents it was thought to be 
the pure coin. The children flocked by scores and 
even hundreds : they were dying with hunger, and by 
going to these places they could " keep the life in 'em," 
and that was what they most needed ; they could go on 
the principle, " if thou hast faith, have it to thyself be- 
fore God," and when the hunger was appeased, and the 
" blessed potato should come, they could say mass at 
home again." When such children were interrogated, 
the answer would be, " We are going back to our own 
chapel or our own religion, when the stirabout times 
are over ;" or when the " bread's done," or the " po- 
tatoes come again." " But you are saying these pray- 
ers and learning tin's catechism." " We shan't say 



802 ANNALS OF THE 

the prayers when we go back — we'll say our own then," 
&c. Now the more experienced father or mother 
would not have said this to a stranger, and such might 
have passed for a true convert, while receiving the 
" stirabout." The priests were very quiet while this 
kind of bantering was in progress ; they knew its be- 
ginning, and by this " concordance " could well trace 
the end ; they held these favored ones of their flock by 
a cord while the stomach was filling, as the traveler does 
his steed that he is watering, and turns it away when 
its thirst is assuaged, caring little at what fountain he 
drinks, if the water be wholesome. " We had as lief 
they would be in that school as any," said a priest, 
" while they are so young ; we can counteract all the 
bad or wrong impressions their lessons may have had 
on their minds." 

The priests of Ireland have had their wits well 
sharpened by the constant check held over them by 
penal laws, and a government church, and they have 
not been guilty of great proselyting, finding as much 
work as would keep them upon the alert, continually to 
keep their own hold, and the flock safe already in pos- 
session. The Episcopalians and Dissenters, on the 
other hand, knowing that they were the minority, and, 
that the power they held was not precisely " just and 
equal," feared that some new king or minister, or some 
sudden government squall, might blow down their un- 
certain bamboo fabric, had to double their cries of 
priestcraft and popery, persecutions and murders, to 
keep their citadels of self-defense well secured, with 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 



the stirring watchword of "popery" ever stimulating 
the soldiery to ready action, in case of insurrection. 
Thus, as they first preached Christ through bullets, 
bombshells, and fire, so they still hold him up as the 
" God of battles," to all who would not receive him 
through the breath of their mouths. 

The soldiery stationed in Ireland are a living proof 
of this principle, and especially so, as this army is re- 
quired to show its warlike power in defense of the mis- 
sionaries stationed there, being called out to display 
their banners when any new converts are to be added 
to the Protestant ranks from the Romish church. An 
instance of this was related by a coast-guard officer, 
stationed in the town of Dingle. Some five or six 
years ago, a half-dozen or more of the Romans had con- 
cluded to unite with the Protestant mission establish- 
ment there, and the Sabbath that the union was to take 
place in the church, the soldiery were called out to 
march under arms, to protect this little band from the 
fearful persecutions that awaited them on their way 
thither. The coast-guard officer was summoned to be 
in readiness cap a pie for battle, if battle should be ne- 
cessary ; he remonstrated — he was a Methodist by pro- 
fession, and though his occupation was something war- 
like, yet he did not see any need of carnal weapons in 
building up a spiritual church ; but he was under gov- 
ernment pay, and must do government work. He ac- 
cordingly obeyed, and, to use his own words substan- 
tially, " We marched in battle array, with gun and 
ba} r onet, over a handful of peasantry — a spectacle to 



304 ANNALS OF THE 

angels, of our trust in a crucified Christ, and the ridi- 
cule and gratification of priests and their flocks, who 
had discernment sufficient to see that with all the 
boasted pretensions of a purer faith and better object 
of worship, both were not enough to shield our heads 
against a handful of turf, which might have been thrown 
by some ragged urchin, with the shout of Q turncoat ' or 
' souper, 5 as this was the bribe which the Romanist 
said was used to turn the poor to the church ; and 
though this was before ^he potato famine, yet the vir- 
tues of soup were well known then in cases of hungry 
stomachs, and the Dingle Mission had one in boiling 
order for all who came to their prayers." The coast- 
guard continues, " We went safely to the church, and 
the next Mission paper, to my surprise and mortifica- 
tion, told a pitying world that so great were the perse- 
cutions in Dingle, that the believing converts could, not 
go to the house of God to profess their faith in Him, 
without calling out the soldiery to protect them." 

This circumstance is quite in keeping with much of 
what is called persecution there ; and though it cannot 
and should not be denied, but that in some cases, there 
has been great opposition and much severity manifested 
by papists, toward those who have left their church, yet 
a spirit of retaliation will never deaden the life of that 
persecuting spirit, nor bring any to see the benefit of a 
religion which bears the same impress which is stamped 
on theirs. These two contending powers have had so 
much to do to keep, one his own foot-hold, and the 
other his flock, that little time has been left for preach- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 305 

ing Christ, or carrying out his gospel ; and I pray to 
be forgiven, if wrong, in saying, that in no place what- 
ever, where Christianity is preached, have the sad ef- 
fects of a nominal one been more fatal. The letter 
without the spirit has shown emphatically what it can 
do. It can make men proud, covetous, vainly puffed- 
up, and it can make them oppressive too ; it can make 
them feel, and it can make them act as did the Puri- 
tan, in the early settlement of the New England colo- 
nies. " The earth," he said, " was the Lord's, and 
the fullness thereof, and what is the Lord's belongs to 
the saints also, therefore they (Puritans) had a right 
to drive out the savages and take their lands ;" ac- 
cordingly they did. The same spirit is literally carried 
out there in the tithe gathering ; these " saints " have 
a claim on what belongs to God, and consequently the 
law covenant belonging to the Jewish priest, under 
Moses, is handed over to them, and whatever barba- 
rian, Scythian, Jebusite or Perizzite dwells in the 
land, must to them pay tribute. The magistrates who 
collect this tribute sometimes do it in the face of spades 
and pitchforks, and stockings full of stones, which the 
brave women hurl ; but having the " inner man " well 
■thened, by both law and government gospel, they 
generally escape with the booty. These ludicrous and 
shameful scenes have measurably abated since the 
tithes are gathered in a form not quite so tangible, by 
merging them in or behind the landlord's tax, who puts 
this ministerial " tenth " into an advanced rent on 
the tenant ; but " murder will out," and the blow is 



306 ANNALS OF THE 

felt as severel} 7 , and by many traced as clearly, as 
when the hand was more tangible. In the summer of 
1848, in the city of Cork, one man belonging to the 
Society of Friends had a good set of chairs taken, 
which the owner affirmed was but a repetition of the 
same proceedings, the Church collectors having a pecu- 
liar fancy for his chairs ; they had taken many sets in 
yearly succession. Now while all this is in progress in 
that country, talk not so loudly of popish heresy being 
the root of all the evil there. First, make the gospel 
tree, which was planted eighteen hundred years ago, on 
the Mount of Olives, bear a little fruit, pluck a few 
fresh boughs from its neglected branches, and kindly 
present them to these popish seared consciences, and 
see and mark well the result. If the book called the 
Bible had been kept entirely out of sight, and its prin- 
ciples been fully exemplified in deed as well as in word, 
there can scarcely be a doubt, but the prejudice which 
now exists against it would never have been known ; 
and had the priests thundered their anathemas either 
from the confession box or the altar, louder and longer 
against reading or believing it, many of them would 
have defied all bulls of excommunication, as well as all 
purgatorial burnings, and have made their acquaintance 
with its pages. When any of these extortions are 
practiced, the ready response is, " This comes from the 
blessed book they're tachin' and prachinV It is the 
substance that is wanting, not the shadow. If popery 
have concealed Christ behind the Virgin, with her long 
retinue of sainted fathers and maids of honor, in the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 307 

persons of St. Bridgets, whose microscopic eyes can see 
him any clearer through mitred bishops and surpliced 
gownsmen, fattened on the gatherings of the harvests 
of the poor, and scanty savings of the widow and fa- 
therless. If the incense from a Roman censer obscure 
the clear light of the Sun of Righteousness, think not 
to blow it away by the breath of alcohol, their smoke 
will only mingle together, and make the cloud still 
thicker. Some paste more adhesive than stirabout," 
and some stimulus more abiding than " soup," will be 
required to keep the scrutinizing Paddy rooted and 
grounded in a new faith, whose fresh lessons are only, 
" Be patient, love, while I beat you, in true genteel 
and c royal style.'" The Celt can quickly discern 
clean hands ; and though his own may be filthy, yet he 
will content himself with the " holy water " of his own 
church to cleanse them, while he sees his neighbor's of 
the Protestant faith a little too smutty. 

While speaking thus of proselytism, and the errors 
of the church, the soup-shops should not be cast into 
entire contempt ; for though they may, and undoubt- 
edly have been, used for bribery there, yet they have 
been used for better purposes, and by the Protestant 
church too. The missionary stations in Dingle and 
A chill, so far as they adhered to their professed object 
in the beginning, which was partly to provide a retreat 
from persecution, and give labor as far as it was prac- 
ticable to those who wished to renounce popery, did 
well. But have they acted entirely in accordance with 
these principles % Let the fruits be the judges. That 



308 ANNALS OF THE 

there are real Gocl-fearing Christians in those churches 
must be believed, but this is not the question. Were 
most of them made so by going there, or had they not 
been taught of the Holy Spirit before entering them? 
The heaven-taught Christian in Ireland in many places 
is driven to great straits to find a fold where the flock 
are fed with the true bread, prepared by those who 
have really come out of the world, and they necessarily 
unite with any, where they can find a home. The 
Roman Catholic who turns to God with full purpose of 
heart, and has been really born of the Spirit, is indeed 
a spiritual Christian ; he drinks deeply at the Foun- 
tain-head, and often exceeds those who had been in the 
path with the Scriptures in their hands for years. One 
Presbyterian clergyman observed, " we must take large 
strides to keep up with them." 

I am not expecting, neither asking one pound of 
money, one good dinner, nor one blessing, for these 
unsavory statements, but they are the common sense 
observation of four years' practical experience among 
that strangely situated people, wl^o have been the 
gazing-stock of the world for so many ages ; and though 
the remark of a Roman Catholic barrister, in the coun- 
ty of Mayo, to his priest, was somewhat severe, yet it 
might be well for the clergy of all denominations to 
look at it, and inquire whether they have not given 
cause for the people to feel, that the benefits which 
have flowed from their ministrations are not on the 
whole a poor equivalent for the money which has been 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 309 

paid to them, and for the honor which has been be- 
stowed upon their reverences. 

This barrister observed that his occupation had led 
him to an acquaintance with the doings of the clergy of 
every denomination in Ireland ; and he had settled on 
the firm belief, that if every one of all classes, Priests, 
Protestants, and Dissenters, were put into a ship and 
driven out to sea, and the ship scuttled, it would be 
better for Ireland than it then was. " Leave every 
man," he added, " to take care of his own soul, with- 
out being led hither and thither, by men who worked 
either for money or party, or for both, and they would 
be in a better condition than they were at present." 
The confounded priest uttered not one syllable in re- 
ply. It is somewhat amusing to a listener, who be- 
longs to no one of them, to be present on any annual 
celebration of these clergymen, and hear the reforma- 
tions going on under their management. 

The Established Church astonishes you with confir- 
mations and the increase of communicants, and if the 
speaker be a missionary, why a few thousand pounds 
would bring half of popish Ireland into his net — could 
he build more cottages and dig more drains, mountain 
and bog for many a mile would be blossoming like the 
rose, and crooked things be made straight among the 
benighted Catholics, and Ireland in the Lord's time be 
a habitation for the righteous to dwell in. The num- 
ber of converts from popery astonishes the credulous 
hearers, and the self-denials and persecutions of the 
missionaries are second to none but Peter's or Paul's. 



310 ANNALS OF THE 

Next come the Presbyterians. They are a numer- 
ous, well-disciplined band, understanding precisely the 
tactics of their creed, and give you to understand that 
they are the true light that might lighten every man 
that cometh into Ireland. They have lengthened their 
cords and strengthened their stakes ; and while many 
yet desire the " leeks and garlics" growing in a gov- 
ernment hot-house, yet some have nobly testified 
against making a hodge-podge church of Christ and 
Mammon. They are not idlers, and their Sabbath- 
schools train their children in the true faith of Presby- 
terianism, as faithfully a*s does the Romish priest in 
his. They, like the Established Church, feel that the 
mammoth incubus that is weighing the godly of Ireland 
down, is the Romish Church, and though they acknowl- 
edge that a state church is not precisely the best thing, 
yet that is not the mountain, but yet would gladly have 
it removed, if by rooting up these tares the wheat 
should not be rooted up also ; for if government should 
let go its hold, and say, " Stand on your own founda- 
tion, or stand not at all," they might be shaken in the 
fearful crash. The regium donum still lingers there, 
and if tithes should slip, why not draw after them this 
" royal gift ?" Many are good preachers and eloquent 
platform speakers ; some have advanced into the free 
air of anti-slavery principles, and an isolated one, here 
and there, may not approve of the practice of war ; 
but few comparatively have abandoned the use of the 
good creature, in moderation, and doubtless they are 
fated to see more and suffer more, and dig deeper into 



FAMINE IN IRELAND.' 811 

their own hearts before they will believe, but that 
" wisdom will die with them." 

The Methodists have a standing in numbers among 
the ranks of Bible-Christians, and their zeal has pro- 
voked many. They pray on, and they sing on, through 
thick and through thin ; they tell you that Methodism 
is the only salvo, and can never praise God enough 
that they stepped into her ranks. John Wesley echoes 
and re-echoes with loud aniens, wherever there is a 
chapel to eulogize his name. They too abhor the 
" beast," and have blunted, if not plucked, some of 
his horns ; but not being quite so orthodox in the eyes 
of their more Calvinistic brethren, they go more on 
their " own hook," working in their own w T ay, than the 
two first named. Though it is to be feared they are 
drinking in and conforming more to the world than for- 
merly, yet they keep well in their own ranks, and let 
the world rock to and fro, their motto is onward ; they 
are not so prone to seek shelter from a storm in time of 
trouble ; and to run over to the enemy till the danger 
is over, as some who are more in search of popularity, 
more timid and less self-denying. They are so un- 
doubting in the truth of what they profess, -that they 
spend less time in securing props to keep up their fab- 
ric ; and consequently, they have more space for preach- 
ing Christ. Those Catholics who are not afraid of en- 
tering into any chapel but their own, are fond of listen- 
ing to the enthusiastic manner of preaching which they 
find there, and are often seen standing about the doors 
of a chapel, with great reverence ; occasionally some 



312 ANNALS OF THE 

are drawn in by the gospel, and remain faithful to 
Christ. 

The Independents are a worthy class, and have un- 
ostentatiously made a good impression on the minds of 
the humbler portion of the inhabitants. Their Bible 
readers have in general been men of untiring faithful- 
ness, and by kindness have gained access to the hearts 
of the peasantry, who listen to the reading of the Scrip- 
tures, "without that opposition which must follow where 
a harsh course and abuse to the priests are manifested. 
One of their readers remarked, that for more than 
twenty years he had visited the cabins, read the Scrip- 
tures, and held up Christ to them as the sinner's 
friend, and in no one case had he been rejected. Some 
of them speak and read Irish, which always gains ac- 
cess to the heart. The Independents in respect to gov- 
ernment aid, reject all regium donums, and they stand 
on a firmer rock than an earthly royal treasure. They 
have funds gratuitously supplied by their own church, 
and their missionaries and Bible readers are mostly sup- 
ported by them. Their pastors are men in general of 
plain common-sense, knowing how to adapt themselves 
and their preaching to the masses ; and had they more 
of a proselyting spirit, would certainly make more 
noise, more money, and add more stony-ground hearers 
to their number. 

The. Baptists, humble in number as they are, should 
not be left out ; they make their way slowly and softly, 
and show much patience in laboring in the destitute 
parts. Their flocks are increasing, and like the station 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 313 

at Ballina, many of their number are from the Romish 
church. These, when they put on Christ by a new bap- 
tism, as they call immersion, the burial with him into 
his death, arise and walk in newness of life, and in 
general remain steadfast in their profession. It is a 
fact, which should be more noticed among all these de- 
nominations, that where Christ is the most faithfully 
preached, error falls silenced, without that struggle of 
argument to maintain its hold, as when some object 
of contempt is held up to ridicule, or to shun ; all the 
enemy's forces are then rallied to the rescue, and often 
the conqueror in argument is the force most weakened 
in the best part. 

The Plymouth brethren, or Bible-Christians as they 
may call themselves, have a numerous body in Dublin, 
and worship Christ in a manner distinct from either 
which have been named. Acknowledging no head but 
Christ, they have no ministers to support, and like the 
Apostles' churches, have all things in common so far as 
this — as when one member suiters, all suffer with it ; 
and accordingly none are left in want. They were very 
active in the famine, working efficiently, feeding and 
clothing many ; and the Sabbath-school in which Christ 
and only Christ was taught, was numerously attended 
by the poor, who were fed and clothed, not as a bribe, 
but as an act of Christian charity, due to the poor. 
" Come, and we will tell you of Christ," was the invita- 
tion, and not come and join us, and we will feed you. 

The Unitarians in Ireland are not numerous, but 
generally wealthy, intelligent, and benevolent. They 
14 



314 ANNALS OF THE 

did much in the famine to ameliorate the state of suffer- 
ing, and to their honor they were many of them teeto- 
talers. Their doctrine to the Catholic is more incom- 
prehensible than any of the " heresies " which they 
meet ; for beside rejecting the Mother, they say they 
reject the Son likewise, and have neither Intercessor 
nor Savior ; and if they were disposed to proselyte, the 
Catholic chapels would not be the " shops " in which 
to set up their " stirabout boilers." The Roman Ca- 
tholics are peculiarly distinct in one noble practice, 
from all other professed Christians we meet. They 
will not in the least gape after, nor succumb to any 
man's religion, because he is great and honorable, 
though they will crouch and call him " yer honor " in 
matters of this world ; but where their religious faith is 
concerned, they call no man master. The Unitarians, 
therefore, collect into their ranks such as, being whole, 
need no physician, and the lamentation or confession 
seldom goes up of being " miserable sinners " and going 
" astray like lost sheep." They are certainly a people 
in their influence over others, especially the lower 
classes, less to be dreaded than those who " hold the 
truth in unrighteousness." The heresy of needing no 
atonement by an infinite God, is more shunned than 
sought after, by all such as have been led to believe 
that man is in a lost state ; for if he is lost, and finds 
himself so, he seeks to be found ; but if no one is in 
the way sufficient to lead him, how is he bettered by the 
inquiry 1 On the other side, those who hold the truth 
in unrighteousness, in other words, who bear no fruit, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 315 

have not the power of it, and when the letter only is 
understood, he who professes Christ and knows him not 
in a fellowship of his sufferings, and a resurrection of 
life, is a more dangerous lure to the inquirer ; for, in 
the first case, if there is no Savior all powerful, there is 
nothing to embrace ; but if there is one in word and 
not in deed, he is more to be dreaded than none at all, 
a false God is worse than none. 

There is a society of Moravians, and it would be 
superfluous to say anything of them, they are so well 
known for their simplicity, sobriety, retirement, and 
good order, that they walk more unseen than any de- 
nomination whatever. They never say, " Come and 
see my zeal for the Lord." The Roman Catholics look 
upon them somewhat as they do upon the Society of 
Friends — a second " blessed people," wondering what 
the religion must be. 

The Society of Friends in Ireland, stand out as they 
do in other places, distinct. They meddle but little in 
the politics of the world around them ; whatever gov- 
ernment they may be under, they sit quietly and let 
the world rock on. A Yearly Meeting of that denom- 
ination is more interesting in Ireland than elsewhere, 
on one account, because they are entirely free from vain 
boasting and whining tales of persecution, or the great 
growth of their denomination, the downfall of error be- 
fore their preaching, &c. You have solemn silence, or 
you have something uttered unvarnished with rhetorical 
flourishes or borrowed extracts from House of Commons 
or House of Lords. Their extracts are borrowed from 



316 ANNALS OF THE 

the Holy Scriptures, their prayers are addressed to the 
Majesty of Heaven, and not to men, they speak as if 
in Ms presence, and sit as if in his presence, and if you 
are not particularly edified, you are solemnized, your 
heart if not melted is softened, and you go away feel- 
ing, that for an hour or more you have been shut from 
a noisy, empty, gabbling world, from a party church 
•which has not stimulated you to kill any priest, or pull 
down any chapel or convent. You feel to inquire, am 
I right ? Is all well within 1 Have I the Spirit of 
Christ ? if not, I am none of his. I have never heard 
that any Roman Catholic has ever turned to that So- 
ciety in Ireland ; but if they had proselyting agents in 
the field they would have their share, or if they had 
even that outward show in their meeting-houses, whioh 
takes away all reserve from the stranger, and gives him 
to feel that the place is for all, many would be induced 
to go in,' that now stay away. 

When stopping in Cork, great surprise was expressed, 
even by some dissenters, that I should take such liber- 
ties as to go to a place of worship where none were 
wished to attend but their own ; and the Catholics sup- 
posed that none could be allowed to enter, but such as 
have on the " particular dress." The caution of these 
people in the time of famine, to avoid the appearance 
of proselyting, was carried to an extent almost unparal- 
leled. It was said that a ministering Friend from Eng- 
land, who had been in the habit of attending or holding 
a meeting in the west part of Ireland when he visited 
them, declined doing so, in the year 1847, when in the 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 317 

same place, lest it should be construed as a desire to 
make converts by the liberality which his Society were 
showing. 

The Catholics in Ireland are the Catholics every- 
where in some respects ; in others they may have some 
shades of difference. \Having always been placed under 
restrictions, they could not always appear free ; and yet 
when these restrictions have been removed they have 
not taken undue advantage, as their enemies supposed 
they would. The removal of the penal laws did not 
make them insolent, but thankful that they again had 
the prospect of being ranked among ' the human fa,mily 
as human beings. That cord of fear by which they 
have been so long held is loosening, and they take liber- 
ties, that at times cause the priest to say that they 
are quite beyond his control, and he is often put down 
at the altar — that most sacred place, when he lays re- 
strictions which are not congenial. Their superstitions 
too are fast vanishing ; fairies and banshees have not 
the hold on the imagination as in former days ; the 
holy wells, and bushes covered with rags and strings 
which had been dipped in the waters, to wash the be- 
lieving diseased one,- are now disappearing. This 
practice is not confined to the Catholics, either in 
Ireland or England, being practiced in the latter 
place to some extent now ; but there is still a most 
fearful practice in the west part of Ireland, which a 
priest related in my hearing, and comforted our horror 
by saying, that he had caned the man most faithfully 
that morning, and it would never be repeated. The 



318 ANNALS OF THE 

practice has been in use for ages, and is called the 
" Test of the Skull." It is this, — when a person is 
suspected of crime he is placed kneeling, and made to 
swear over the Bible that he is innocent, and then lay- 
ing his hand on the skull, he invokes heaven that the 
sins of the person that owned thfft skull in life, with 
those of the seventh generations before and after him, 
might be visited on his head if he were guilty, and if 
this swearing was false, the skull was to haunt him in- 
cessantly day and night, to the end of his life. This 
horrid practice is so loudly spoken against, that it is 
performed with the greatest secrecy when it is done. 
It has extorted many a confession that nothing else 
would do, and is found a very useful experiment in in- 
corrigible cases. The skull used is always the skull of 
the father, if the father be dead, which makes it mere 
terrific to the suspected one. 

Superstitions of these kinds are prevalent more upon 
the sea-coasts and in the mountains, where the inhabit- 
ants are secluded from much intercourse ; and sitting 
in their dark cabins, or climbing the crags upon the 
lofty mountains or cliffs hanging over the sea, they hear 
the constant roar of old ocean, or the hollow groaning of 
the wind, as it winds through the defiles and caves ; 
and having no intelligent intercourse and no books, they 
conjure up all that imagination is capable of doing, and 
when it is conjured up and brought a few times before 
the mind, it is reality which is difficult to efface. Their 
fairy superstitions are not frightful, and go to show a 
very poetic turn, of which the mind of the Celt is quite 






FAMINE IN IRELAND. 319 

capable. Fairies are always pretty, "light on the fut," 
and light on the wing, are pleasant and playful, par- 
ticularly fond of children and babies, and often ex- 
change them when the mother is gone or asleep, and 
many times she never knows the difference ; frequently 
she has been heard to complain that a sicklier child has 
been put in her child's place, and sometimes blue eyes 
have been exchanged for gray. They never like to dis- 
please one of these gentry, lest she should be disposed 
to kill or injure the child. I found these ideas still 
lingering among the mountains, where some of them 
would not be willing to leave off red petticoats, because 
they kept the fairies from doing any little mischief 
which otherwise they might do. The " Angel's Whis- 
per," too, has a foundation in real truth. It has long 
been supposed that a sleeping infant hears some pleas- 
ant thing whispered in its ear by the ministering angel 
that is always hovering near ; and it is noticeable that 
the superstitions of the peasantry are more poetical 
than frightful, and they generally turn all supernatural 
appearances to a favorable account. But the famine 
changed their poetical romance into such fearful reali- 
ties that no time was left to bestow on imagination. 



CHAPTER IX. 

" Shall I see thee no more, thou lov'd land of sorrow ?" 
LAST LOOK OF IRELAND, AND THE SUMMING UP. 

The time had come when the last long adieu must 
be taken of a people and country, where four years and 
four months had been passed, and it would be impos- 
sible to put the last penciling upon a picture like this, 
and not pause before laying it aside, and look again at 
its " Lights and Shades " as a whole. In doing so, the 
task is more painful than was the first labor, — First, 
because these " Lights and Shades " are imperfectly 
drawn ; and second, because no future touch of the 
artist, however badly executed, can be put on ; what is 
" written " is " written," and what is clone is done for- 
ever. My feet shall never again make their untried 
way through some dark glen, or wade through a miry 
bog, or climb some slippery crag to reach the isolated 
mud cabin, and hear the kind " God save ye kindly, 
lady ; come in, come in, ye must be wairy." Never 
again can the sweet words of eternal life be read to the 
listening way-side peasant, when he is breaking stones, 
or walking by the way ; never will the potato be shared 
with the family group around the basket, or the bundle 



THE FAMINE IN IRELAND. 321 

of straw be unbound and spread for my couch. Never 
will the nominal professor, who learned his Christ 
through respectability, without even the shadow of a 
cross, again coolly say, " We do not understand your 
object, and do you go into the miserable cabins among 
the lower order ;" and never, oh never ! again will the 
ghastly stare of the starving idiot meet me upon the 
lonely mountains I have trod ; never again will the 
emaciated fingers of a starving child be linked in sup- 
plication for a " bit of bread," as I pass in the busy 
street ; though the painful visions will forever haunt 
me, yet the privilege to relieve will never again be mine 
in that land of sorrow. It is over. Have I acted 
plainly 1 — have I spoken plainly ? — have I written 
plainly? This is all right, — for this no apology is 
made. But have all these plain actions, plain speak- 
ings, and plain writings, been performed with an eye 
single to the glory of God 1 If so, all is as it should 
be ; if not, " Mene, Tekei " must be written. 

These pages speak plainly of Clergymen, of Land- 
lords, of Relief Officers, of the waste of distributions, 
and of Drinking Habits. Are these things so ? Glad 
should I be to know, that in all these statements a 
wrong judgment has been formed, and that they have 
been and are misrepresented. Yes, let me be proved 
even a prejudiced writer, an unjust writer, a partial 
writer, rather than that these things shall be living, 
acting truths. But alas ! Ireland tells her own story, 
and every stranger reads it. 

The landlords have a heavy burden, and if the bur- 
14* 



322 ANNALS OF THE 

den cannot be removed, it is right that they should be 
heard. Even if by their own neglect or unskillfulness 
they are now where they feel the wave rolling over 
them, an.l this wave is like to swallow them entirely, 
what philanthropist would not throw out the life-boat 
and take them to land ? If they are not good steers- 
men, then place them not again at the helm ; if they 
neither understand the laws of navigation, nor the du- 
ties of captains to the crew, assign them a place where 
with less power they can act without injuring the help- 
less, till they learn lessons of wisdom from past ages 
of recklessness and thoughtless improvidence. And 
while God says, " What measure ye mete shall be 
measured to you again," yet who shall presume to deal 
out this promise, nor let one retaliating lisp be encour- 
aged to clothe the oppressive or careless landlord in 
like rags that his tenants have worn. Give him a se- 
cond coat, and though his hands may not be adorned 
with rings, yet dress him in clean garments, and put 
shoes upon his feet. If you give him not the " fatted 
calf," yet feed him not on the one root which his 
scanty pay has compelled the sower and reaper of his 
fields to eat, strip him not of the last vestige his habi- 
tation may possess of decency and comfort, and shut 
him not in the walls of a workhouse, to lie down and 
rise up, go out and come in, at some surly master's bid- 
ding. Let him walk among men, as a man breathing 
free air on God's free earth that he has freely " given 
to the children of men." Say not to him, when you 
see that his day has already come, u Ah ! I told you 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 823 

so." Conscience, if lie have any, will tell hirn that, 
and if he have not any, you cannot furnish him with 
one. There are landlords in Ireland who have measur- 
ably rendered what is " just and equal," if not wholly 
so. There are Crawfords and Hills, who have done 
nobly and outlived the storm, and there are many 
others, who like them have acted well, but could not, 
and have not outlived it. In one crumbling mass, 
they and their tenants are looking in despair on each 
other without cause or disposition to recriminate, and 
when they part, it is like the separation of kindly 
members of one family, united by one common interest. 
These are some of the bright spots, green and fresh, 
which still look out upon that stricken country, and 
leave a little hope that lingering mercy may yet return 
and bless her with the blessing that adds no sorrow. 

The minister, too — shall his sacred name and calling 
be on the tongue and pen of every wayfaring traveler 
who may chance to pass through his parish, and tarry 
but for a night — who may hear but a passing sermon, 
and that a good one, too, and hasten away and denounce 
him as a hireling or unfaithful ? Let candor, courtesy 
and Christianity forbid it ! 

The watchmen on Ireland's wall have had a stormy, 
bleak night to guard the city, and amid the roar of tu- 
multuous tempests have scarcely known how to guide or 
to warn the lost traveler into a safe shelter — they may 
have seen clanger through a false glare — they may have 
warned when no danger was nigh, and they may have 
wrapped their robes about them, and hid from an enemy 



324 ANNALS OF THE 

when they were the only leaders that could have led to 
victory. Some have split on the fatal rock — love of 
gain ; others are insnared by the deceitful, nattering 
word, "respectability." This above all others seems 
to be the hobby ; nor is it confined to the Established 
Church : they as a body are so well paid and honored, 
that they have less need to keep up a struggle respect- 
ing the name, as most of them (the curates excepted) 
can and do hang out the indisputable sign — a carriage, 
and its accompaniments ; and if the character of such 
an one be inquired after, however he may live, and how 
far removed from the vital principles of the gospel he 
may be, if not among the vilest, "Oh! he is very re- 
spectable ; if you should see his gardens, and grounds, 
and carriage, and then his glebe-house, and his wife 
and daughters — they're the ladies." The dissenting 
classes, who profess by their very dissenting, that they 
believe more fully that the regenerating spirit of the 
gospel calls for newness of life, and nonconformity to 
the world ; yet to induce the world to follow them, to 
become members of their body, they must throw out 
the bait of " respectability," to keep up an influence 
which conformity to the world alone can do ; that part 
of the legacy which Christ left, they acknowledge is a 
good one when applied to real martyrdom. When the 
disciples were told that if they hated me, they will 
hate you also, and that they must " rejoice and be ex- 
ceeding glad," when all manner of evil should be said 
of them, for his sake ; but for disciples in the nine- 
teenth century the constitution of things is changed, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 325 

and as a " good name," the wise man tells us, " is bet- 
ter than precious ointment," this "good name" must 
be obtained, even though a few circumstantials in the 
Christian creed should be modestly suspended. This 
" good name " is the last thing that the professed Chris- 
tian will leave in the hands of Christ ; he will intrust 
him often with his property, his indefatigable labors, 
and even life itself ; but his reputation, ah ! his repu- 
tation is too sacred to go out of his hands ; and mark ! 
this reputation is one acquired according to the customs 
of the world. Here is the fatal split, here it is, where 
he who purchases this article, purchases at the expense 
of that vitality, and indwelling principle of holiness, 
which, if nurtured and kept alive, by walking in the 
liberty of Christ, will go on from one degree of grace 
and glory, till the perfect man in Christ is attained. 

The dissenting Christians of Ireland, many of them, 
are wealthy enough to be respectable ; and though they 
are not in general as high as their " Established " 
brethren ; yet those who have a regium donum can 
figure somewhat genteelly, and if they do not attain to 
the highest notch they do what they can ; if they can- 
not keep a coach and four, they would not be inclined 
to ride meek and lowly, as their Master did through the 
streets of Jerusalem, and will get the best carriage 
their means will allow. 

Now respectability is not to be despised ; • but seeking 
it at the expense of that humility, that condescending 
to men of low estate, that not only giving to the poor, 
but doing for the poor, and doing too at the expense of 



826 ANNALS OF THE 

our own ease, and in face and eyes of the customs of a 
God-hating world, is reprehensible, and wholly and en- 
tirely aside from the precepts and examples of Christ 
and his followers ; and though to the blameworthy this 
may appear severe, because true, yet I cannot be a 
faithful recorder of what I saw and experienced in Ire- 
land, without leaving this testimony, which I expect to 
meet at the judgment, that a proud, worldly, respectable 
Christianity is the first great deep evil that keeps that 
country in a virtual bondage, from which she never will 
escape, till the evil be removed. The awful gulf which 
is placed between the higher and the " lower orders " 
there, is as great between professed Christians and the 
world, as between the estated gentleman or titled lord, 
who makes no pretensions, and in many cases much 
greater. There are lords, sirs, and esquires in Ireland, 
who would sooner admit a bare-foot into their back-door 
and hear his tale of woe, than would many of the dis- 
senting classes, of so-called followers of the meek and 
lowly Jesus. Why is it so 1 Simply this, not because 
these lords and gentlemen were Christians, but becausa 
they were not in danger of losing a standing which a 
worldly government had given them, by so doing, while 
the dissenter., a step lower in worldly honor, without 
sufficient vital piety to fall back upon, must keep the 
respectable standing that he had, or he was lost forever. 
And before closing these pages, duty requires to correct 
statements which have been made by many of the mis- 
judging class of Irish who read the first volume, and 
have said that I had no opportunity to give a true ac- 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 327 

count of the character of the people there, because I 
mingled with none but the lower classes — I give the fol- 
lowing illustrations : — This is a mistake wholly and en- 
tirely. I did not make long visits with the higher or- 
ders except in few cases, not because I was not treated 
with all the courtesy and attention that vanity would 
require by some of these, but because my message was 
to the poor ; and the attentions of the great were not 
recorded for many reasons, among which, some of the 
most prominent are, that many such persons do not 
wish to read their names on the random pages of an un- 
pretending tourist, or a vain smattering one ; and if 
their vanity could be fed the greater caution should be 
used to withhold flattery, for they are in no need of 
compliments ; and beside, they have only done what 
they could easily do without sacrifice, and are required 
by the common claims of civility to strangers, as well as 
by the higher requirements of the gospel, to do. And, 
again, what traveler who has whirled through that 
island on a coach, and who, in his own country was 
scarcely known, beyond his humble seat in the church 
or chapel where he was wont to sit, but has carefully 
wrapped a complimentary card, given by a titled gen- 
tleman, to a dinner, to show to his family to the third, 
and probably fourth generation, of the great honor be- 
stowed on him. And in conclusion, on this part of the 
subject, let it be said, that access was gained to every 
class of people in Ireland, some by " hook and by 
crook," and others by an " abundant entrance," and 
by a greater part of them was I treated with more cour- 



328 ANNALS OF THE 

tesy than by those a notch or two below, in worldly 
standing. 

The old hackneyed story of popery in Ireland has 
been so turned and twisted that every side has been 
seen — nothing new can be said about it. There it 
stands, its principles are well known, its superstitions 
and persecuting character, its idolatries, and all its 
trimming and trappings, are the same in essence, as 
when Queen Elizabeth put her anathemas forth against 
its creeds and practice ; and with all her errors she 
maintains a few principles and practices which it would 
be well for her more Bible neighbors to imitate. Her 
great ones are more accessible ; the poor of their own 
class, or of any other, are not kept at such an awful 
distance ; the stranger is seldom frowned coolly from 
their door ; to them there appears to be a sacredness 
in the very word with which they would not trifle ; the 
question is not, is he or she " respectable," but a stran- 
ger ; if so, then hospitality must be used without grudg- 
ing. In the mountains, and sea-coast parts, it has ever 
been the custom to set the cabin door open at night, and 
keep up a fire on the hearth, that the way-faring man, 
and the lone stranger, should he be benighted, could see 
by the light that there is welcome for him, and if they 
have but one bed, the family get up and give it to the 
stranger, sitting up, and having the fire kept bright 
through the night. This has been done for me, with- 
out knowing or asking whether I was Turk or Christian ; 
and were I again to walk over that country, and be out 
at nightfall in storm or peril, as has been my lot, and 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 329 

come in sight of two castle-towers, one a Roman and the 
other a Protestant owner ; and were the former a mile 
beyond, my difficult way would be made to that, know- 
ing that when the porter should tell the master a stran- 
ger was at the gate, he would say, " Welcome the 
stranger in for the night, or from the storm." The 
Protestant might do the same, but there would be a 
doubt. His answer would probably be, "A stranger ! 
How comes a stranger here at this late hour ? tell him 
we do not admit persons into our house unless we know 
them." Christian reader, this is one strong reason why 
you should admit them, because you do not know them. 
The Catholics are much more humble in their demeanor, 
and certainly much more hospitable and obliging in all 
respects, as a people. They are more self-denying, 
will sacrifice their own comforts for the afflicted, more 
readily will they attend their places of worship, clothed 
or unclothed, and beggars take as high a place often in 
the chapel, as the rich man ; the " gold ring and costly 
apparel," is not honored here, as in the Protestant and 
dissenting churches ; and it is remarked that when any 
turn to the Protestant faith, they never lose that con- 
descension, nor put on those pretences of worldly re- 
spectability, as their Protestant brethren do. 

A little for the Relief Officers at parting. To those 
who have been intrusted with money for the poor, and 
have been bountifully paid for the care of the loan put 
in your hands, if you have done by the starving poor, as 
you would that they should do unto you in like circum- 
stances — if you have given the same quality and quan- 



330 ANNALS OF THE 

tity of bread, that you should be willing to receive and 
eat — if you have never sent a starving one empty away, 
when you had it by you, because ease would be dis- 
turbed — if dinners and toasts have not drained any 
money that belonged to the poor, then " well done, good 
and faithful servant ;" and if you have may you be for- 
given, and never be left " to feel the hunger.- ? My lot 
was to be once in a house where a sumptuous feast was 
held among this class of laborers, and that was in the 
midst of desolation and death. They "tarried," to 
speak modestly, " a little too long at the wine " that 
night, and drank toasts, which, if they honored the 
Queen, did little credit to men in their station, and in 
their responsible work. But I have seen and handled 
the " black bread " for months, and have told the story. 
I have seen many sent from the relief, on days of giving 
it out, without a mouthful, and have not a doubt but 
many died in consequence of this, when they should and 
might have been fed. Time will not allow of dwelling 
on these cases ; but one which was vividly impressed, 
and particularly marked at the time, may serve as a 
specimen. Going out one cold day in a bleak waste on 
the coast, I met a pitiful old man in hunger and tatters, 
with a child on his back, almost entirely naked, and to 
appearance in the last stages of starvation ; whether his 
naked legs had been scratched, or whether the cold had 
affected them I knew not, but the blood was in small 
streams in different places, arftl the sight was a horrid 
one. The old man was interrogated, why he took such 
an object into sight, upon the street," when he answered 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 831 

that he lived seven miles off, and was afraid the child 
would die in the cabin, with two little children he had 
left starving, and he had come to get the bit of meal, 
as it was the day he heard that the relief was giving 
out. The officer told him he had not time to enter his 
name on the book, and he was sent away in that condi- 
tion ; a penny or two was given him, for which he ex- 
pressed the greatest gratitude ; this was on Wednesday 
or Thursday. The case was mentioned to the officer, 
and he entreated not to send such objects away, espe- 
cially when the distance was so great. 

The next Saturday, on my wa}^ from the house where 
the relieving-officer was stationed, we saw an old man 
creeping slowly in a bending posture upon the road, and 
the boy was asked to stop the car. The same old man 
looked up and recognized me. I did not know him, 
but his overwhelming thanks for the little that was 
given him that day, called to mind the circumstance ; 
and, inquiring where the child was, he said the three 
were left in the cabin, and had not taken a " sup nor 
a bit" since yesterday morning, and he was afraid 
some of them would be dead upon the hearth when he 
returned. The relieving-officer had told him to come 
on Saturday, and his name should be on the book, he 
had waited without scarcely eating a mouthful till then, 
and was so weak he could not carry the child, and had 
crept the seven miles to get the meal, and was sent 
away with a promise to wait till the next Tuesday, and 
come and have his name on the books. This poor man 
had not a penny nor a mouthful of food, and he said 



332 ANNALS OF THE 

tremulously, " I must go home and die on the hairth 
with the hungry ones." The mother had starved to 
death. He was given money to purchase seven pounds 
of meal ; he clasped his old emaciated hands, first fell 
upon his knees, looked up to heaven and thanked the 
good God, then me, when the boy was so struck with 
his glaring eyes, and painful looks, that he turned 
aside and said, " let us get away." The old man kept 
on his knees, walking on them, pausing and looking up 
to heaven ; and thinking myself that seven pounds 
would not keep four scarcely in existence till Tuesday, 
we stopped till he came upon his knees to the car ; he 
was given money enough to purchase as much more ; 
when, for a few moments, I feared that he would die on 
the path. His age, exhaustion by hunger, and the feel- 
ings of a father, together with the sudden change, from 
despair to hope, all were so powerful, that with his 
hands clasped, clinching the pennies, and standing up- 
on his knees, he fell upon his face, and for some time 
remained there ; he was finally restored to his knees, 
and the last glimpse we had of this picture of living 
death, he was behind us on the path, descending a hill 
upon his knees. What his destiny was, I never knew ; 
but the relieving-officer expressed no feelings of com- 
punction when told of it some time after, nor did he 
know whether he had applied again. If he died, what 
then? was the answer. This solitary case is only a 
specimen of, to say the least, hundreds, who might have 
been saved, had these stewards applied the funds where 
most needed. Those who were obliged to walk miles, 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 833 

and lie out over night upon the highway-side, were 
sent back to come again, while those who lived nearest, 
had the most strength, and could clamor the loudest 
for their rights, were soonest supplied. This relieving 
officer w T as an Irishman, and though among some of 
these there was great compassion and long continued, 
yet as a whole the English were much more so ; and 
had they, without being advised or influenced in the 
least by the Irish landlords and Irish relieving-officers, 
taken their own course, much better management of 
funds and better management for the suffering would 
have followed. The English were unused to such 
sights as Ireland in her best times presents, besides 
they never had oppressed these poor ones, while the 
rich, powerful Irish, like our slaveholders in the United 
States, had long held them writhing in their grasp, 
some of them beside had been too lavish, their means 
for sporting and pleasure were lessening, and why not 
take their share of what they wanted, while it was in 
their hands 1 The English officers, entirely unac- 
quainted even with the location of distressed districts, 
till, for the first time, their eyes were saluted with 
these frightful sights, would certainly be led to apply 
means, when and where more experienced ones should 
direct. The Irish landlords too, had another strong 
temptation. They had many comfortable farmers, who 
till the famine, had not only paid them good rent, but 
had turned the worst soil into beautiful fields. They 
must either abide on the land and pay less rent, or 
none at all, till the famine ceased, or they must emi- 



334 ANNALS OF THE 

grate. Now a few hundred pounds would keep these 
tenants on their feet, and pay the landlord. And if 
these landlords had not before been influenced by the 
grace of God to do justice, it cannot be expected in this 
peculiar crisis they should suddenly be transformed to 
act so against their own worldly good. Who would 
trust a dog with his dinner if the dog be hungry 1 These 
are not random strokes made to finish a book, nor to 
gratify a splenetic sourness — particular prejudices have 
not been the spring of motion in this work ; but being 
flung into all and every position, how could I but see all 
and everything that fell in my way 1 In the worst dis- 
tricts my tarry was generally the longest, and in some 
cases I literally carried out the precept, " Into whatever 
house ye enter there abide and thence depart," where 
the most information could be gained, and the family 
who invited me were able to supply all needful things, 
and had urged the visit, however protracted it might 
be ; and in the face and eyes of all sincerity on their 
part, they had been taken at their word, and though 
the blarney grew thinner and weaker, yet I had long- 
since accustomed my palate to bread without butter or 
honey, and potatoes without gravy or salt. 

Ireland possesses an ingredient in her composition, 
beyond all other nations — an elasticity of such strength, 
that however weighty the depressing power may be, she 
returns to her level with greater velocity than any peo- 
ple whatever, when the force is removed. Then arise 
to her help ; let every Protestant and Dissenter put on 
the whole armor ; let them together cast tithes and 



FAMINE IN IRELAND. 335 

regium donums " to the moles and to the bats," and 
stand out in the whole panoply of the gospel ; then in- 
deed will they appear " terrible as an army with ban- 
ners ;" let their worldly respectability be laid aside for 
the " honor that comes from God ;" let them do as 
Christ did, u condescend to men of low estate." Who 
can tell, if the professed church of Christ of all denomi- 
nations should do her first work there, but that a loop- 
hole would be made, through which government might 
look beyond the dark cloud that has covered her reign 
over that island, and joyfully say, " Live, for I have 
found a ransom !" For though government now holds 
the church in her hands, could she do so if the church 
was moved by an Almighty power 1 Cod now suffers, 
but does he propel? Is not the machinery of the 
church there one of the " sought-out inventions," which 
never emanated from the uprightness of God 1 See to 
it, see to it, and then talk with success of the idolatries 
of popery. 

The dark night had come, my trunk was packed, and 
the vessel was in readiness that was to bear me away. 
When I entered that pretty isle in June, 1844, all was 
green and sunny without, water, earth, and sky all 
united to say this is indeed a pleasant spot, but why I 
had come to it I knew not, and what was my work had 
not been told me ; step by step the voice had been 
" onward," trust and obey — obey and trust. The 
ground had been traversed, and in tempest and dark- 
ness my way was made to the packet, on the Liffey, 
with one solitary Quaker, who was compelled to hurry 



336 ANNALS OF THE FAMINE. 

me among the tumultuous crowd without time to say 
" Farewell." A few friends had assembled to meet 
me there, who had been tried ones from the beginning, 
but so great was the crowd, and so dark was the night, 
that they found me not. 

The spires of Dublin could not be seen, and I was 
glad — I was glad that no warm hands could greet me ; 
and above all and over all, I was glad that the poor 
could not find me ; for them I had labored, and their 
blessing was mine, that was a rich reward ; and when 
my heart shall cease to feel for their sufferings may my 
" tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth." 



41 Sow thy seed, there is need, never be weary, 
Morning and evening withhold not thine hand; 
By the side of all waters let faith and hope cheer thee, 
Where the blessing may rest is not thine to command. 

u Do thy best, leave the rest, while the day serveth — 
Night will assuredly overtake noon ; 
Work with thy brother, while he thine arm nerveth, 
Without him, or for him, if holding back soon. 

"As the grain, oft in pain, doubt, care, and sadness, 
The husbandman needs must commit to the soil, 
Long to struggle with darkness and death, if in gladness 
He may hope e'er to reap the new harvest from toil. 

" Sow thy seed, there is need, never mind sorrow, 

Disappointment is not what it seems to thee now ; 
Tears, if but touched by one heavenly ray, borrow 
A glory that spans all, — the bright promised bow !" 



3^77-2 



